Love Be Brave
by PeppermintP4tty
Summary: PAILY - AU College. Loosely based on a story I read years ago and thought it would kind of fit. The story is mostly written, about 10 chapters with an Epilogue. It's a kind of response to my fears about them breaking up on the show, so it will be happy - it's not too traumatic. Some Spencer, Aria and Holden - no Hanna Rated M eventually, and for swearing.
1. Chapter 1

**CHAPTER ONE:**

**California.**

Emily can hear only noise, crushing, squealing, sirens wailing and people, hurrying, crying, screaming. She can only see, vaguely, through eyes that are shutting through exhaustion, shock and pain the vague blue lights of the ambulance, recognisable just before it turns into the rippling blue calm of a pool as she slips into unconsciousness. Her last thoughts are for her family, for her friends, for the people she's loved, and for those who she never will get to love as the blue light changes to a blinding white.

The paramedics are scrambling through the wreckage of the bus. A vague desire is becoming an urgent need, to at least find one, one whom they can save, one whom they can redeem and who will redeem them. As they scurry from body to body, exhausted, scared, at last one comes upon a hope,

"Oh, God. I think this one's alive. I think this one's alive. Oh God. Oh God, please." He feels Emily's pulse, takes a look at her broken, twisted body. Yells over the noise and his own fear, "Over here! Over here!"

**XXXXX**

**Eighteen months later. Pennsylvania.**

Semester of her third year about to start, Paige is determined this will be her year. She's going to anchor the relay and record the best times she can in the 100 and 200 butterfly, and challenge for the freestyle. She's solo-captain this year too, thanks to Robinson's backing out, but she can handle it, Coach thinks she can handle it, she's ready. So, she's determined to put in the extra hours in the gym, convinced that upping her weight programme will improve her times. It's the main reason she and Holden have been working out at the gym all summer. Today though, Paige notices Coach Brennan's light on, even thought it's two weeks before term starts, and it bothers her.

"Wonder what's going _on_ in there."

Holden's struggling underneath the bar that Paige is supposed to be spotting him for. He grunts,

"I mean, what she's doing? She doesn't normally turn up until a week before term starts. What's she _planning_?"

"Uh, Paige?"

Paige suddenly remembers what she's supposed to be doing there. Grabs the bar with two hands and lifts it up onto its support.

"Geez, Holden, you're such a wimp."

"Thanks." He gets up, wiping his neck and face with his towel. "Why are you so bothered by her being in?"

"I don't know. It's just odd is all." Paige rubs the back of her neck with her left hand, "just makes me feel uncomfortable. I mean, as Captain, she should include me in some of her decisions, right?"

Holden raises an eyebrow sceptically,

"I don't think that's how it works."

Paige nods agreement, smiles wryly,

"You're probably right."

After showering and changing, Paige is waiting for Holden outside in the corridor, reading the notice boards. As Holden emerges he swings his duffle–bag into her.

"Anyway, you need to concentrate less on your Coach's whims and more on your own. When are you gonna settle down and make some lovely lady very happy?"

Paige laughs at him,

"What, like you and Aria? Yeah, no, I don't think that's gonna happen any time soon."

As she's in the process of speaking, Coach Brennan's door opens and she steps out, followed by a girl, she's about Paige's height, around her age, dark-haired and Paige would have said she was a swimmer, except she's carrying too much weight, but the breadth of the shoulders, the tell-tale gait, all point towards it. Even thought it's warm, she's covered up with a light sweater, skinny jeans and converse. She's stooping as if to ward off intrusive glances, keeps her head down. She looks briefly behind her, hearing voices, and for a moment, catches Paige's eye. Both half-smile, look away. Paige pausing momentarily, something about her looks familiar, but she shakes it off as Holden chuckles lightly in Paige's ear,

"I'm sorry, what's that you were saying?"

Paige spins, quickly swats him on his arm, catching him off balance so he stumbles. In the commotion, both forget the girl, forget Coach Brennan, as Holden chases Paige down the hall towards the exit, where they head off into town.

**XXXXX**

The following week, Paige gets a message to meet with Coach Brennan. She's a little apprehensive, unsure why she'd be called in now, before term has even started, but can't think of a reason why it would be bad. Her grades at the end of the year were nothing to write home about, but they were solid. Her times were good and getting better. She shrugs worry off as she's standing outside Coach's office door, deciding that it's more than likely that Coach has decided she needs a Vice-Captain and to run her choice by her.

"Paige, come in."

Paige rocks forward on her toes, bouncing slightly, smiles, stuffs her hands in her hoodie pockets and steps into the room.

"Sit down. How are you?" Brennan smiles at Paige, trying to keep her relaxed. She's got a big favour to ask and she's pretty aware that Paige isn't going to like it. "You're looking good, Paige, strong. You been following that program I gave you?"

Paige leans forward in her chair so she's resting her forearms on Coach's desk,

"Thanks. Yeah, yeah. I think it's gonna make a difference, you know. I feel good. I've been doing some running too. I like it. Helps me clear my head, you know?"

Coach Brennan nods.

"Good –" but Paige is slightly flustered, a little worried, so she bowls on,

"Um, yeah. I feel really good. Like, better than ever before a swim season starts. I think I'm gonna hold the anchor position down this season."

She smiles, blinks, waiting for a response. Coach Brennan clears her throat.

"Ok, Paige. That's kind of what I wanted to talk about." She looks steadily at Paige, considers if her decision is the right one.

When Paige first came to the college, she was cocky, kind of arrogant. With some reason, she was the best swimmer in her state and if Brennan's honest, it was something of a coup to get her to the university on the best scholarship she could wangle. But her success at swimming, honed in part by her father, was at the expense of some humanity. And Coach is considering how Paige has changed in the years she's been under her care. She's mellowed, softened, let her soft side show some more. It suits her.

At first, Brennan tried it as an experiment, making Paige first co-Captain, then, when her co- gave up half-way through the year, giving her the full responsibility and it's worked, it's given Paige a confidence in herself not just her swimming. She's had to take some responsibility for the care of the girls on the team. She has to be relied on, she's had to learn what motivates them, what scares them. Brennan relies heavily on her Captains, they have to be the eyes and ears in the locker room, to relay her wishes and her tactics, but also to have the ear of the team, to have the strength and confidence to let her know when the team is unhappy, or if someone needs a kinder word or a kick up the ass. So Brennan's always been honest with Paige. Always tried to be a role model to _her_ as much as anyone.

Paige looks up at her expectantly, clear gaze. Brennan sighs,

"Ok. We're welcoming someone new onto the team." She watches for a reaction, so far nothing except a quizzical crinkle of the brow. "She's a third year, like you, although a couple of years older."

"Ok," said slowly, pondering the meaning, "she transferring?"

"Kind of." Paige watches as her Coach shuffles in her chair. Paige trusts Brennan implicitly, has since the moment they met. "You may remember a year, 18 months ago, the coach crash with the CSU student swim team?"

Paige nods, of course she remembers, anyone who even remotely had an interest in swimming remembers. Parents remember, friends remember, because it was the worst thing anyone could think to happen. A coach full of the brightest and the best, hand-picked to be hand-moulded, polished and worked to within an inch of their lives to become the next big thing, the swimming stars of the next generation. Rumour was they had a shot at becoming the swim team for the Rio Olympics. All wiped out. One clear, bright, cold afternoon, on the way to a meet, their coach hit a patch of black ice and careered off the road, all killed instantly, driver, coaches, future superstars of swimming. All except one. Emily Fields. Paige presses her fingers to her eyes, she knows who it is, this mysterious transfer student.

"_Fields?_ Here? Wh – why?"

Coach Brennan laughs at her obvious confusion,

"Well, thanks for the support for my program, Paige."

"Uh, no, no that's not what I meant. But, she could go _anywhere_."

"Yeah. She could. But she's chosen to come here." Coach shrugs, "She has a friend from High School here, someone she's close to, that was a major factor in her decision."

Coach is watching Paige closely. She knows she's no fool. She knows she's starting to work out what it means for her if Emily Fields is coming to this College on a full-ride scholarship and a guaranteed spot on the team. She watches as Paige thinks, goes to say something, sighs and drops her head.

"Oh." She looks Coach in the eye. "So. Anchor goes to - ?"

"I'm sorry, Paige, as long as she gets her times up, of course."

"Sure. So, what about my butterfly? That safe?"

"Yes, Paige. And I still want you on my relay team."

"Sure. Just. Not as anchor. Captain?"

"Paige, I would never take Captain off you. You're too good and too valuable to me. And another thing." Paige groans, "I'm gonna need you to support her. She's still pretty out of shape and fragile. She's going to need support and a friendly eye. Someone to sound off to when I push her. Because I'm gonna _have_ to push her. _Hard_."

Paige glares at her Coach. What she wants to do is what she would have done as a teenager, to sound off, to shout and bitch about how unfair it is. How hard she's worked the last two years, just like she promised when she first turned up here. How she's done everything Brennan's ever wanted. How she's learned and watched and waited for her moment. And now. Not only does she not have a moment, she also has to be a baby-sitter to some has-been superstar. Paige can only imagine what kind of a brat Fields is going to be.

But Paige takes a deep breath, she's different now. She's not that person anymore, the one who would fight and kick out and it's taken hard work and a lot of patience from the Coach for one and she's not about to let her down. So she sighs and nods her head slightly.

"Ok." Brennan gives her a genuine smile.

"Thank you."

"So. Is she, um, _ok_? I heard she was in a pretty bad way."

"She was. Still is in some ways. She's only just getting back in the water. But, the body is a miraculous thing, Paige. The body doesn't lie."

Coach's favourite saying. Paige smiles resignedly back at her.

"Sure, Coach."

Dismissed, Paige leaves her office, disappointment dogging her steps. But she'll do what she can; for the good of the team, for the good of the Coach. Paige just hopes she doesn't end up hating both the Coach and Emily Fields by the end of the season.

**XXXXX**

She cycles slowly through town back to the house she shares with Holden and Aria off-campus. She's known Holden forever, ever since he was the scrawny kid in 6th grade, the one who was regularly picked on; the one bullied and dumped in the garbage. She watched for a while, then her natural sense of justice kicked in when she witnessed a particularly vicious attack. She tried to help him, wading in, fists flailing, pulling hair, not even knowing what the fight was about, but knowing enough that it was unfair and wrong. Ever since then, they've been inseparable. Holden was the one who held her when, 14 years old, she had her epiphany that the reason she blushed and got tongue-tied around the girl in her swim team, was that she _liked_ her. He held her again when she finally came out to her parents and her dad didn't speak to her for three months. She was the one who called him out on his stupid hair-cut; who encouraged him to train and try for Tang Soo Do and who watched him get his ass kicked in competitions until eventually, he stopped getting his ass kicked and instead, started to win them. He's done the same for her, every swim meet he could get to, even the shitty inter-school ones in NYC, he's seen them all.

It became almost inevitable that they'd apply for the same colleges, and, when they had offers, conferred and chose the same one. Holden had become more than family to her in the last couple of years of High School, once her dad had practically disowned her, only letting her stay in his house to save face and to placate her mom.

She'd been the one to meet Aria. They're majoring in the same subjects, English and Film Studies. Paige encouraged Holden to ask Aria out during the holidays of their first semester after she got fed up of him mooning over her. They've been together ever since and although Paige spends a _lot_ of time with them, they never make her feel like the third wheel. It was inevitable they'd move in together, the three of them. Like Aria said, who else was going to put up with Paige's crazy and who else would she live with that didn't _make_ her crazy.

As she's cycling by along Main Street, she finds herself thinking about Emily and has a sudden reminder of a training video her dad got her, back before he started freezing her out, when his main obsession was her swimming career rather than her sexuality. It was a video her private coach had got of Emily Fields, at 14, a competition video that he'd taken. Her dad made her watch it, kept reminding her, "_this_ is your competition, remember that, watch her, learn from her, anything you can do to make you better, better than this, better than _her_".

Paige wobbles slightly, steadies herself, remembering how she obsessively watched the video. With the benefit of hindsight, Paige thinks, it wasn't purely for swimming reasons she was obsessed with the video. She remembers being in awe of the girl in the video, her speed and power, but also her grace as she moved, both on and off land. She snaps herself out of her reverie, considering the same thing as before, about what a brat Emily Fields probably is now. How damaged she must be.

**XXXXX**

Aria's the only one home when she gets there. As Paige enters the front room of the little house, she takes off her messenger bag and flings it on the couch, loudly groaning as she slumps down into the cushions. Aria peers round the kitchen door,

"Ok, Mrs Drama-Queen. How'd it go with Coach? You off the team?"

"Don't even joke about it."

For a moment, Aria looks worried, her brown eyes widening in surprise, until Paige gives her a reassuring smile,

"Nah, don't worry. I'm still on the team. I'm still Captain – still _solo_ Captain I'd like to add – only now I've got to baby-sit one Emily Fields."

She pauses, waiting for Aria to cotton on. She doesn't. Paige sighs,

"Swim team crash? CSU? The brightest and best of a generation wiped out?" Aria remembers, nods, "yeah, well, all except one."

"Ok. And that one is –?"

She looks expectantly at Paige, who gives a rueful smile,

"Yeah, coming here. Onto _our_ swim team. Coach sure does want to win the divisionals this year." She shakes her head.

Aria perches next to Paige on the couch,

"So, what does that mean for you?"

"Oh, nothing, just a loss of the anchor for the relay and baby-sitting duty." She pauses dramatically,

"Doesn't sound so bad."

"Oh, _come_ on, Aria. What kind of an insufferable brat is she gonna be? All those _Sports Illustrated _articles, the incessant _hype_, the future generation blah, blah, blah."

"Um, I don't mean to interrupt your rant, Paige, but, she has lived through some kind of nightmare."

Paige rubs the back of her neck and sighs,

"I _know_. And it makes it _worse_. 'Cause, I can't even _bitch_ about her now."

Aria laughs and stands up, giving Paige a playful shove on her arm,

"C'mon, Superstar, you'll be fine." She turns back to her as she reaches the kitchen, "who knows, she may be alright. You have to at least give her the benefit of the doubt."

Paige makes a sound halfway between a scoff and a laugh.

"Yeah, ok, I know, I'll be _mature_ about it." Waits a beat, "hey, though! What are you making me for dinner?"

Paige ducks, grinning, as an oven glove comes sailing out of the kitchen.

**XXXXX**

Two weeks after her interview and Emily makes sure she's standing at the margins, the edges, where she feels safe and comfortable. Her eyes hit the floor, she's scared of what her eyes show now, scared of what others can see there. For years before, she was the centre of attention, the focus – for swim meets, for magazine covers, for prospective scouts, for her positions on the podium. So, today, she's trying to slip under the radar, positioning herself at the back of the warm locker room, where she can be the observer rather than the observed.

She looks around the group of girls gathered in front of their Coach, all listening, watching expectantly. And Emily has to admit, having heard the best, that Brennan isn't bad. She's tough, but warm, seems like she'll give those who need it a hard time, but not afraid to put a friendly arm around shoulders. Emily thinks of her own damaged and scarred shoulders. Two years ago, they were strong, a few creaks here and there, but what championship level swimmer doesn't have _some_ aches and pains, doesn't need some kind of surgery or pain-killers. Hers are held together with metal and wire now, muscle taut and damaged, thick scarring from the crash winds around the shoulders and the rest of her body. She used to be proud of her body. It was a thing to be admired. Now she's too aware of how fragile it is, just skin and bone easily broken, torn and shattered. Now her muscles are hidden under a layer of flab and she knows it's going to hurt so much to regain what she had before – if she even can, if she even wants to.

She looks around the locker room again, aware that the pep talk is coming to an end, Brennan's ramping up the team talk, signing off with a call and response common in all locker rooms – designed to create a feeling of togetherness, team responsibility – phrases that she'll have to learn if she's to become truly part of it. She suddenly realizes that Brennan has come to the end of her talk and is now making the introductions of the new team members. This is the moment she was dreading, she watches, feels herself blushing as she waits,

"So, team, we'll learn who's swimming what and where over the course of the coming month. I just want to introduce someone who you should get to know pretty well – Paige McCullers, your team captain."

Emily looks up, surprised to see the girl that she noticed coming out of the gym when she was having her interview, the one fooling around with her boyfriend, stand up, confidently take a bow and salute, grinning,

"Hi. Hey, though, don't listen to anything these guys say," she indicates the majority of the team standing behind her. The locker room has split into the 'old' hands and the newbies. Paige is addressing the newbies with a lop-sided grin, "I'm really alright. Just talk to me if you need to, that's all." She waits a beat, "Oh, though, just know, if you don't pull your weight, I _will_ kick your ass." She's rewarded with cheers from her team-mates. Emily's pleased, at least if the captain's popular it means she's fair. Brennan steps forward again, says wryly,

"Ok, thank you for that, Paige."

She introduces the first years, gives a brief background on each of them, and then moves round, until, dropping her voice a little, she smiles at Emily,

"So, finally, I'm sure some of you have already heard the rumours" Emily sighs, _already_ there are rumours? "We're very lucky to have someone joining the team who, I think, is going to help us do well in Divisionals this year. Emily Fields."

Emily smiles, blushing madly and Paige watches her carefully. Instead of the arrogant, cocky girl she anticipated, she recognizes someone else, someone different, as Emily struggles to look up from the patch of floor she's staring at and gives a small, shy wave. The rest of the team is watching unsure of how to react, as Paige takes a breath, then steps forward.

"Alright. Come on team, let's welcome Emily." And begins to clap. The team joins in and the clapping goes on for far longer than Paige intended, until she realizes that it's not a clapping just for Emily being here and on their team, but for what she's gone through. It's a clapping that she survived. That she's been so close to death and come through it. Beaten it.

Finally, instructions are given for the team retreat the following weekend, and information about dry-land month, until they're dismissed. Paige sticks around chatting to her old team mates and encouraging the new ones, watching out of the corner of her eye as Emily seems unsure where to go. She looks lost as if there's a wall of steel between her and the world and she's not sure how to relate to anyone around her. Paige has been reading up on the crash and on Emily, she remembers that she lost her friends, her team-mates, even rumours of someone closer and Paige can't imagine how you even begin to get over that. She read the _Sports Illustrated_ follow-up story that said she died twice in the ambulance. For all of Paige's insistence that Fields is going to be a brat, she can't actually find any evidence of it, either in things she's read, or in the way she's acted today. In fact, she just seems scared and unsure.

Eventually, the last few stragglers are gone. Paige checks into her old locker and picks up her leather messenger bag, taking out her key to her bike lock that she keeps on an old shoe lace. Leaving the locker room, she spots Emily waiting outside Brennan's office. Paige smiles as she gets closer to her,

"Hey."

She jumps in response to Emily's shocked response,

"Woah. Calm down, sorry, I didn't mean to scare you."

"Oh, no. You didn't. I was just thinking."

"Lost in your own world, huh?"

Emily smiles a little ruefully, she does this a lot now, blacks out, loses time, not even sure where she is sometimes. She describes it as blacking out, but it's not. It's more like a flash in her head – a panic that draws her deep down into herself.

"Something like that."

She notices Paige looking at her, can only imagine what kind of a freak she's coming across as, looks as Paige holds out her hand for her to shake,

"I'm Paige McCullers, swim team captain."

Emily shakes her hand,

"Yeah. I recognize you. Um, Emily, Emily Fields."

"Yeah I know. I know who you are."

Emily blushes and looks away. Doesn't want this, doesn't want people to know who she is, to look at her like she's a freak. She feels like she's a freak. Part of her wishes she could have just stayed at home forever, kept away from people, from prying. She doesn't want to have to get back into the real world. Doesn't want the pain and the mess that comes with people. Part of her reason for choosing this college was Spencer. Someone she knew from before, someone who knows her, who doesn't treat her like she's some freak from a museum, to be stared at. She doesn't want to open herself up to get to know other people, new people. Doesn't want to expose her heart to losing them again.

"Um, Coach won't be here. She doesn't hang around this first week. She'll be in tomorrow if you need to see her."

"Oh." Emily wasn't really waiting to see Coach Brennan for anything other than wasting time before Spencer finished her tutorial when she'd arranged to meet her. She shrugs then and looks at her watch.

Paige takes a moment, pauses and then plunges in anyway, if she's been asked to baby-sit, she may as well start sooner than later.

"So, you have somewhere to be, or do you want to grab a coffee? I can show you round some of the local hang-outs, see what you think."

Emily panics. She starts to sweat, her palms growing warm where they're holding her bag. She can't:

"Er, thanks, but, I'm meeting a friend of mine."

Paige smiles back at her,

"Ok. Don't worry. Maybe another time."

And she pads off down the hallway, unaware that Emily's leant back on the wall, head back, breathing heavy, staring at the ceiling, murmuring,

"Can't do this. I can't do this."

Her panic-attack is momentary. She's getting used to them. They hit a couple of times a day. The first time it happened she was in the garden at her parents' house. She was terrified, but also slightly amused, she could survive a bus crash, could survive dying twice, and now was having a heart attack in her garden, the place she should feel safest of all. It was only when her mom witnessed it that she became aware of what it was. Her doctor gave her breathing exercises to use when they came on, so she can master them now. But it doesn't mean they're any less terrifying when they do come.

When her breathing and heart-rate return to normal, she reaches in her bag for her phone. She'll only be a few minutes early to meet Spencer so she decides to head off there.

Spencer spots Emily waiting for her in the quad.

"Hi. How'd it go? How's the team? They're gonna be _so_ stoked to have you swimming for them."

Emily smiles awkwardly.

"Yeah. They seem nice. Coach is good, I think I'll like working with her." Thinks, she's different than I'm used to. Kinder.

They head off campus towards Emily's rooms. She's been given private rooms, almost a private apartment. It's clean, spare and sparse. There's little that's personalized about it, but in a way, Emily likes that. The room's a little sweetener that Brennan managed to arrange, a private room one of Emily's only demands on coming here after she heard about the full-ride scholarship she'd been offered.

"Yeah. Your Coach is supposed to be pretty cool." Spencer cocks her head towards Emily, "I've been doing some asking around." She carries on walking, "the only one you gotta watch is McCullers."

"Paige?" Emily's interest is aroused by this. She worried she's pissed Paige off by refusing her offer of coffee, but she thinks they'll be ok. She intends to ask her for a tour of the gym and natatorium to make up for it and doesn't think Paige would hold her refusal earlier against her.

"Yeah. That's the one."

"She's team captain."

Spencer gives a huff.

"Wonder how she managed to bribe her way into that one."

"I don't know, Spence, she seems pretty popular. The team seem to like her, Brennan sure seems to trust her. They don't even have a vice-captain."

Spencer snorts her disapproval again,

"Yeah, well, you never know what people will do. Just, don't trust her is all I'm saying."

Emily smiles indulgently at Spencer. She's known her a long time and Spencer's always been protective of Emily. It's one of the main things they fight about, because it's got a lot worse since the accident.

"Why? What's it to you? She seems ok."

"Em, just, don't."

"No, Spence, you don't just get to say something and then not explain. It's going to be really difficult for me to avoid her. She's captain, she's – she _was_ anchor of the relay team."

"Oh, wait! What does that mean? Have they made _you_ anchor? At her expense? Oh boy, you really want to watch out."

"Spencer! They can't just make me anchor until they start timing us. But, I want to know what you've got to say about Paige."

Spencer stops to look at Emily, sighs,

"Let's just say she messed a friend of mine about pretty badly."

"Ok. A guy? 'Cause I saw her with a guy when I came for my interview with Brennan. And they looked pretty cool to me."

Spencer looks taken aback for a moment,

"Um, Em? I think you need to check if your gaydar got broken in the crash. Paige doesn't have a boyfriend. Doesn't do boys. At all."

"Oh. She's _gay_?"

"Yeah. And she messed around a friend of mine pretty badly in our first year. Anyway. Just steer clear." Spencer looks at Emily, a little twinkle in her eye, "Actually, I kind of wanted you to meet her."

"Who?"

"My friend. Dani."

Emily blushes, looks past Spencer.

"Spence. I'm not really interested. I just want to concentrate on swimming, getting myself back fit and trying to sort out my studies. I'm not looking for anything."

Spencer smiles, once she's got an idea in her head, it's hard to push it out. Emily knows this of old and isn't looking forward to the challenge.

"Ok. But, she's nice. You should meet. And Em, you can't be alone forever. Ellie wouldn't want that."

"Alright. But can we drop it for now? Let's just go out for a meal before I have to start this new diet Coach has given me."

Emily sighs as she turns away. She thinks she's speaking the truth when she told Spencer she's not looking for anything now. But the seed is sown and Spencer's not about to let it go.


	2. Chapter 2

**Thanks for follows and reviews. Glad people are enjoying so far - let's see how it goes. Someone asked about the name of the original story, sorry I read it years ago & only remember it was something to do with 'light' so... There's more Paige/Emily interaction this chapter so I hope you enjoy.**

The team bus arrives on time and Paige sets about harassing her team-mates onto it. Donnelly, Hersh and Narcizo take the back seat as usual, Hersh leaving a seat for her which she has to decline. Some of the newbies have already started to buddy up after a week of gym work and have settled into the rear-middle section of the coach. All of them are excited. Paige would love to just sit back and relax with her shades on and earphones in, but she knows what Brennan expects of her, and without a vice-captain, a lot more responsibility falls on her shoulders on these kind of trips. So, she sits near the front of the bus fielding questions, and dealing with problems, mainly from the first years. Every now and again, she sneaks a look at Emily, sitting on the front seat of the bus; eyes hidden behind a pair of wraparounds, earphones in, grimace fixed on her face. She thinks back to the conversation they had before they boarded the bus:

Paige had noticed Emily standing a little off to one side of the rest of the team. She's worried that Emily is going to find it hard to integrate herself into the team and knows that Brennan sees it as Paige's particular job to make sure that doesn't happen. She's also aware of how hard it must be for Emily to step back on a bus after the accident. Paige is kind of in awe of the fact that she hasn't outwardly freaked about it. She steps up to her, mindful of what happened in the corridor after the first team talk and clears her throat loudly before resting a gentle hand on Emily's arm.

"Hey."

Emily turns and gives Paige a smile that doesn't reach her eyes.

"Hi."

"You ok?"

"Yes. Thanks. I'm fine." Her voice is cold, mechanical.

Paige nods slowly.

"Ok." She waits a beat, looks away down the road to the direction where the bus should be coming from. "The retreat's always at the same place. It's pretty cool. Some cabins right up in the dunes leading down to a private beach. The retreat's pretty full on, you know, hard work? But, in the evenings we get pretty much free rein. The beach is amazing," Paige is just talking now for the sake of it, but she's noticed that Emily's posture has relaxed slightly. "Some of the sunsets are incredible. I've got some pictures on my phone from last year if you want to see?"

Paige fumbles for her phone in her hoodie top as Emily nods and steps closer to look at the phone. She smiles over some of the stupid ones – piggy-back fights, the usual stupid face pulling, and oohs and ahhs over a couple of the photos of sunsets. She sighs and hugs herself.

"So. What's the point of the retreat?"

"I think Brennan sees it as the team-building to end all team-building. Get it all done at the beginning and it'll see you through the rest of the year." Paige watches Emily's reaction, "I guess you didn't do this in your old team?"

Paige is surprised when Emily smiles, shaking her head lightly,

"Oh. No. There was really no _team_ building. This seems so different."

"Yeah? I mean, yeah. It is, I guess. So what, it was just you on your own?"

"No. It was _worse_. It was win at all costs – on your own, no easy rides, no 'team got your back'. Competition was the key and that was the end of it. Dog eat dog."

Paige watches Emily talking. Can see something like fear in her eyes. And a sadness. She feels inadequate. She's never dealt with anything like that, nor has she ever dealt with something as monumental as the loss that Emily's gone through and she feels herself becoming amazed at how Emily seems so gentle, so humble after everything. Paige shifts a little, feeling uncomfortable,

"Doesn't sound like you enjoyed it much?"

Emily looks at Paige finally, her eyes seem so sad, Paige feels a pull in her chest that she just wants to step forward and hug her, but she's not sure how to and Emily is so closed in on herself Paige feels it would be too much of an imposition,

"No. I – I guess I didn't."

"I guess Brennan has a different approach to your old coach?"

"Yeah. Yeah, she does. She seems ok?" Emily says it as a question, something she seems to need affirming rather than a statement. Paige nods,

"Yeah. She's ok. Don't think she won't work your butt off though. She can be real tough when she wants to be. Her big dream is winning the Divisionals, she has this 'friendly' bet with the guys' athletic coach about who'll be the first of them to win a Divisional and she wants to beat him _so_ badly. He is an arrogant jerk though."

Emily smiles back at her, and nods, she's grateful to Brennan for having given her this second chance and feels she owes her something,

"Ok, then. I guess we have to work to make that happen for her."

Paige grins,

"Yeah, Fields. I guess we will."

Paige hears the bus pulls up behind her. As she turns away to start ushering the rest of the girls onto the bus, Paige thinks she hears a quiet, "Thank you" from behind her, but she isn't sure.

**XXXXX**

Emily realizes that Paige wasn't kidding when she said about the retreat being tough. The morning involves a 5.30am start with a yoga session, straight into circuits and weight training. Emily's quickly covered in sweat, shirt sticking to her. She catches Paige's eye, notices her grin, mock-glares back at her. And although it's hard work, Emily's amazed to find how much she's enjoying the feel of her body working. After the accident there were concerns whether she'd be able to compete again, but she was given the best specialist care her parents could afford. So, it feels good, feeling the pull and the ache in her muscles , the sweat on her clothes and skin.

After lunch, Brennan takes the team down to the water's edge, the sound of the surf the background to a visualization exercise, after which is scheduled a run through the dunes. Brennan puts the girls into pairs, she sets out the course, giving each pair a time in which they should complete it. Paige and Emily have been paired together.

Paige sets off at an even pace, unsure of how Emily will do. She shouldn't have worried, even though Emily's clearly carrying a few pounds extra, she keeps up with Paige easily, eventually as she finds her rhythm and breathing she cruises past her, laughing as she hears Paige's indignant yell,

"Hey! Fields! Hold up!"

Paige has spent most of the summer running and training in the gym. She's in good shape. Really good shape. She kicks on and catches Emily just as she stumbles, her eye having been taken by an old fisherman's shack. She stops, making her way towards it. Paige nudges her arm,

"Hey? What are you doing? We've got a time to make."

Emily brushes her off, wrenching open the door and stepping inside,

"Yeah. We'll be ok. Plenty of time. I just want to –"

Paige steps inside with her. The shack has been boarded up for years. It's dusty, with just some old boxes shoved in the corner. Light is creeping in through the boards and it takes a moment for Paige's eyes to adjust. She sees Emily step up to the boarded up window and try and peer out through the holes. She says, quietly,

"Can you imagine sleeping in here when no one else is around? Must be amazing. So quiet. Just the sound of the waves lapping a few hundred yards away. So much peace."

"Emily?"

Emily turns back to face her, Paige pauses a moment, then asks,

"How are you?"

"Good. I think, tired, but good."

"No. I mean. With everything. Are you ok? Do you think about it a lot?"

Emily gives a little laugh, says quietly,

"All the time, Paige. Sometimes I don't know what's real 'cause all I can think about is the crash and the people that I lost."

Paige swallows loudly, part of her wishes she hadn't started this, but Emily doesn't seem to mind,

"I didn't even _like_ all of them, Paige, my coach, I kind of _hated_ by the end, but it's like we're bound together forever somehow. And then it seems in some way I'm an afterthought. Like no one was supposed to survive and I've spoiled the story. It's like I'm back from the dead." She turns away from the window, gives a rueful smile. "I suppose in some ways its true." She waits another beat, "but I feel so terribly guilty."

Paige wants nothing more than to back out of the hut and run, just run away, she doesn't know what to say, and she's scared. Emily seems to be lost in her own thoughts. She's noticed this about her in the past week, sometimes she seems like she disappears inside herself. Her eyes are far away and Paige worries that neither she nor anyone will ever be able to bring her back, not properly. Paige curses herself for starting the conversation.

Suddenly, Emily snaps back, she gently touches Paige's shoulder, walks past her out into the bright sunlight of the autumn day, starts running calling behind her,

"Come on, slow coach. You gonna at least try and keep up?" She speeds up as Paige stumbles behind her, breath coming raggedly until she too shakes off the feeling of dread that had settled on her.

**XXXXX**

Later that day, evening meal over, Paige finds herself sitting in a semi-circle around a small campfire in the dunes. She's kept an eye on the first years, answered their questions, tried to make sure they're feeling part of the team, but she's pretty sure Brennan won't begrudge her the last couple of hours before bed-time talking with her friends. The sun is disappearing over the sea and there's a faint breeze that's come up with the sun's setting, but the dunes are keeping the worst of the winds off them, it's quiet, the rushing of the waves and a rustling of the breeze through the grasses on the dunes the only sounds.

Paige is relaxed, finally. She leans back on her hands, stretching her legs out in front of her as she looks over the sand to the horizon. She enjoys the murmur of the girls' talk, she's not really engaging, but every now and then she gets pulled in. She's not quite sure how it happened, but Emily is sitting close to her left and every now and then, Paige becomes aware of her and she watches her more intently. To all intents and purposes, she's just keeping an eye on her like Coach asked her to. In reality, she's becoming quite fascinated by her. She's realised her belief that Emily's going to be a brat is far away from the truth of Emily and Paige finds herself a little more awe-struck with every passing hour she spends in her company. She notices Emily look back at her and becomes aware that she's been staring at her. Emily gives her a wary smile, whispers,

"Are you ok? Have I done something wrong?"

"What?" Paige needs a moment to gather herself, "No. Um. No. I was miles away."

"Ok. I just thought, I don't know, I had dinner in my hair or something."

Paige laughs,

"No – your hair's perfect. Um, I mean, you know, there's nothing in it. No dinner – or – anything."

Inside Paige curls with embarrassment. Firstly caught staring and then fumbling over making a dumb compliment. But Emily doesn't seem phased. She laughs and turns her attention back to the main conversation.

As the evening wears on, Paige becomes aware that Lucy Donnelly's sneaked in a hip-flask of vodka and is half-way to being drunk. Paige knows Donnelly's faults and she groans as she recognises the flash of mean come into her eyes. She braces herself to step in, Paige has become practiced at how to handle Donnelly's outbursts, but she's not sure whom it's going to be aimed at. Donnelly takes a swig from her flask and grins, turning her attention to Emily. Paige wasn't expecting that, not this early on, anyway.

"So. Fields."

Emily's open, unaware, she turns her head to look at Donnelly, open gaze, friendly.

"I was reading some stuff."

"Yeah? About?"

"You. Actually." Donnelly takes another drink and wipes her mouth, "_Sports Illustrated_ – the 'follow up'" she says, dramatically, "and I was just wondering, what it's like."

Emily's posture has stiffened and Paige, close beside her, feels her fold into herself a little more. Paige doesn't know what to do. Nothing's happened yet and she doesn't want to appear over-protective, and knows that to ensure Emily is accepted onto the team, she has to deal with Donnelly herself. But there are limits to what Paige can allow.

"What what's like?"

Emily's usual openness of tone is gone. Her voice is wary, tired.

"Well. _Dying_ I guess."

Paige can see Donnelly's mean grin from where she's sitting opposite her; she feels the others intake of breath as a collective force. Hersh and Narcizo swivel their heads to look at her. She feels her fists clench a little. Emily doesn't answer for a moment. Paige is close enough to feel her shudder as she takes a breath and her hand shake as she pushes her hair away from her face. Donnelly jumps in, assuming she's not going to answer.

"Is there a blinding white light? Do you hear God? Come on. What's it like?"

Emily knows it's a test, but it's not something she can think to joke about. It's not something she can articulate either. Sometimes, in her quieter moments, she wants to talk about it. But not in public, not when she's being goaded (and she's been bullied enough times about her sexuality, her appearance, her swimming to be aware when it's goading, when a reaction is what's required). She was thinking about it earlier, after she and Paige returned well within their allotted run time that actually, Paige is someone she feels she could maybe talk to about it. One day. That for all Paige's bravado, for her arrogance and confidence in the captain's role, that Emily can recognize someone that she thinks would understand. But at the moment, she's a little scared of Paige because of that, because there's something in the way she looks at her that makes Emily think Paige can see into her and see that sometimes, she's just about keeping it together and making it through the days and she can do without that.

Emily's aware of Paige's tension. Instinctively she knows that Paige wants to jump in and save her, but she also knows that to be accepted and to stop this here, now, or be prepared to tolerate it for as long as she's at this university, swimming on this swim team, she has to shut it down herself. She holds Donnelly's gaze.

"You want to know what it's like?" She can do this. She's been around enough jocks to know how to respond to the teasing, the bullying, the high-intensity joking around. "Well. There's no choirs of angels or anything like that. There's no before and after really. I guess, you know like, _before_, you're a virgin and _after_? You're not – oh - and I'm guessing you _do_ know that?" The rest of the girls chuckle, Donnelly shuffles, she's not sure about the tables being turned on her, but she started this and has to roll with it, "well, it's kind of like that. It's just happened and you're different, but not _outwardly_ different."

Paige releases a breath. She stands up, looking at her watch, speaks through gritted teeth with a forced lightness of tone,

"Come on then, superstars of America, time we got to bed, or coach will have our asses. Early start in the morning and we need to be bright and shiny."

The girls are happy to break up the circle, they can sense Donnelly pushed it too far and want to put the conversation behind them. Paige watches the girls gather their stuff and make their way back to the cabins. She can feel her anger coursing through her. She catches Donnelly by the arm before she can get away and pulls her back towards her, growling in her ear,

"Try anything like that again, Donnelly and I _swear_ you'll never swim on this team again. Scholarship or no."

Donnelly tries to hold Paige's gaze, but her stomach feels like acid, she feels ashamed and looks past Paige's shoulder, afraid to lose face, but unable to justify her actions.

"Fuck off, Paige."

Paige doesn't respond, she lets Donnelly's arm go and she shakes her off. She turns to find the other groups of swimmers dotted through the dunes. That job done, she checks the fire's out, covers it with sand and makes sure no one's left anything. She stands a moment to watch the sea, sighs, she feels like she let Emily down.

As she turns to go back, she notices a figure between her and the cabins, recognizes it as Emily. Unsure if she's waiting for her or if she just needs a moment to get over Donnelly's stupid comments, Paige walks slowly towards her, planning on just walking past if Emily makes no sign. As she comes level to her, Emily smiles and turns to walk with her,

"Hey. You told the rest of them to head back too?"

"Yeah. They need to be ready for the morning." She watches Emily out of the corner of her eye,

"Um. I'm really sorry about Donnelly. She can just be a jerk sometimes."

"It's ok. I've had worse."

"Yeah. But, I feel like I should have stopped it and I'm sorry."

"No, Paige. You didn't need to do anything. I think it was best that you didn't step in."

"Yeah. Maybe you're right."

As they reach the small complex of cabins, Paige is aware of Coach Brennan sitting on her porch watching them. She gives a small wave and turns to Emily,

"I'm gonna wait up to make sure the others get back in."

"Sure. If you want company I'll wait with you?"

Paige catches Emily's eyes and smiles,

"That'd be cool."

They've reached the steps of the cabin they're staying in and Paige sits on the top step, Emily sits on the opposite side. Neither says anything for a moment, until Paige hears Brennan call her. She makes a face to Emily and steps over to Brennan's cabin.

"Hi Coach."

"Hi Paige. Everything ok?"

Paige is aware that Coach is asking how Emily is, but she doesn't think Emily would thank her for spilling about what happened with Donnelly in the dunes just now.

"Yeah. Although, I think Donnelly is worried about Emily."

Coach Brennan leans forward in her chair studying Paige,

"Ok, why?"

"Um, 'cause she swims breast-stroke, I guess. Look, she hasn't said anything, but I can tell she's unsettled."

"She doesn't need to worry."

"Mm, but she _is_. I just think maybe you need to have that conversation with her."

Brennan raises an eyebrow, when she appointed Paige as captain and told her she needs to be direct with her, she wasn't quite sure she meant her to be this direct. But perhaps she's right.

"Ok. I'll consider doing that. What about you? Are you worried?"

Paige grins back at her,

"Nah. You've already as good as told me if Emily gets her times up the anchor spot's hers. And unless she suddenly discovers an aptitude for the butterfly, I think I'm pretty good."

"Don't get too cocky, Paige. Some of those first years are breathing down your neck."

"Yeah, we'll see."

Brennan leans back on her chair, effectively ending the conversation. Paige turns to walk away,

"Anyway, night Coach."

"Night."

The cabin complex is cast in shadow even though moon is full and Paige can only see a flash of Emily's teeth and her dark eyes watching as she sits back down on the step of the cabin. She looks across at Emily who's fixated on a point down beyond the complex, back towards the dunes.

"I'm just listening for the surf. Like in that fisherman's shack we saw today."

Paige lets her go on listening, tries to tune in herself and finds she can only vaguely hear the rush and pull of the sea against the shoreline. She thinks its odd that she's not feeling more uncomfortable, sitting here with a girl she's only known a couple of days. She's waiting for it to get uncomfortable, even though they're not talking, it doesn't feel like it's for want of something to say, just that maybe it's not the right time to say it. She leans her head against the newel post, hears Emily clear her throat to speak,

"Um, none of the others have come back yet."

"Figures. I'll give them a bit then I'd better go hurry them on."

Silence falls, until, once again, Emily breaks it.

"So, does your girlfriend mind you coming on all these retreats and all the training you have to do?"

Paige raises her eyebrows,

"Ok, first of all, how do you know I'm gay? And second of all, what makes you think I have a girlfriend?"

Emily chuckles, and Paige is struck that with all the time she's spent in Emily's company for the last couple of days, she's never really heard Emily laugh freely before now. She likes it. It makes her smile back at her,

"I have my spies."

"Yeah, well, you need to change your spies."

"Oh?"

"Ok, a _bit_. Yes, I'm gay, no, I don't have a girlfriend. Haven't for a while actually."

"Mm. Well, I should confess, my spy didn't say anything about a girlfriend, I just fished for that one."

Paige suddenly remembers something Brennan said in their meeting a couple of weeks ago,

"Oh, yeah, Brennan said you've got a friend here. Anyone I know?"

"Yeah. I think you know her. But I don't think you like her."

"Woah. What's she said about me? There's no one I don't like."

"Try Spencer Hastings."

Paige's face falls, _Oh_.

"Oh. I see. Yeah, she and I didn't hit it off so well."

"Yeah, she reckons you're a _player_."

Paige puts her head in her hands, Emily laughs again, a little louder this time.

"Ok, I did mess her friend around a little."

"Yeah. Spencer's pretty loyal where her friends are concerned."

Paige is just thinking, _Of course. Of course the one person you know is the one person who hates me. Even Dani's forgiven me for what happened._ Then something strikes her,

"So, um, why would Spencer talk about me and Dani?"

Emily smiles,

"I think she was trying to _warn_ me about you."

"Wh-? Oh, ok. _You're_ gay?"

"Yeah."

"Are _you_ seeing someone?"

Emily's smile disappears for a moment, the one she gets on her face is a little plastic and Paige mentally kicks herself, _of course,_ she remembers the rumours in the articles she's read,

"No. Um. Ellie died in the crash."

Paige looks away, ashamed and unable to hold Emily's gaze.

"I'm sorry."

"You weren't to know. Look, don't worry about it. I'm the one who brought it up. I guess, somewhere I wanted to talk about it. It kind of makes it easier if someone knows."

"And there's no one now?"

"I haven't been with anyone since Ellie. I haven't even thought about it." Emily shrugs, gives a small, private smile, "though, I think Spencer _thinks_ I should be thinking about it."

"Huh. I guess when you're ready, or - or whatever then it'll happen."

"I guess." Emily sighs and Paige can sense something more, something else. There's something about Emily and her sadness, because it is a _thing_ almost separate from her, that Paige wants to reach. She waits, takes a breath,

"Emily? I've noticed sometimes, you kind of zone out, it's like you go inside yourself." She looks warily at her, worried she's treading too close, pushing too far, "you don't just zone out though do you? You kind of _get lost_?"

Emily stiffens. She isn't sure she wants to talk about this, not yet. Her first instinct is to block Paige out. Her second is fear at someone getting so close so quickly. She turns her eyes back to the dunes, is quiet so long, Paige worries she's angry, or upset, or both. When she does speak her voice is so quiet, it sounds like it's coming from inside a dark well,

"I get pulled in, Paige. Somewhere so dark I can't see anything, can't feel anything. At all. But the lack of feeling feels worse than the pain at the accident. And sometimes I see this, _blinding_ white light and it feels like it's happened all over again."

She hears Emily's voice breaking and shuffles over to her side, she doesn't touch her. Not yet. Just rests so close she can feel the soft hairs from Emily's arm, the warmth of her skin brushing against hers. She can almost feel Emily being pulled back. For a moment, she's terrified for her, scared that she'll lose herself completely. And Paige is aware that she really wants to be her anchor, wants to be the thing that keeps her from slipping loose from her moorings and disappearing. She reaches out the little finger of her left hand and runs it down the back of Emily's hand, eventually looping it round her little finger. At that, Emily seems to respond. She sighs, looks at Paige's hand and smiles at her.

"What do you think it is? I mean, what's happening, what do you think it's about?"

"I don't know, Paige." She shakes her head, "but it's terrifying. I lived. They didn't. And sometimes I get so scared that I don't know how to live in this world anymore. It doesn't seem fair. And sometimes, I think, I contemplate how it would be to …. Not live."

"Emily, you had to _fight_ to live. You _died twice_. But you came back. You fought back. _Twice_. You fought back to live your life and to still be here. They didn't. Or couldn't. You didn't give in. You can't give in now. You know what they say, 'the hardest thing to do in this world is to _live_ in it'." Paige cringes, can't believe she's said that out loud. Emily turns and looks at her, a slight smirk on her lips,

"_Who_ says that, Paige?"

"Um, I think it was Buffy, but, you know, I think it holds true."

Emily takes Paige by surprise, she throws her head back and laughs. After her initial shock, Paige joins in.

"Sorry, I'm so lame."

"Paige, you're not lame. Trust me."

Paige smiles, unsure where to go from here. She realizes she's tired, mostly from the shock of the intense training, but she's also a little emotionally battered as well. Emily is too, she can't talk about it any more today,

"So, are you the only one on the team?"

"What? Oh! Who's gay? Apparently not now." Emily smiles, "No. Lauren's gay – you know, Hersh? Bound to be one of the first years. But not many of us." She shrugs,

"So were you and Lauren together?"

"Woah, woah, woah, That's all that you get out of me. I'm not playing truth or dare, Fields. Look, I better go and get the others in, or Brennan's going to have a field day with them tomorrow. You go in, get some rest, you must be beat. I'm feeling tired and I haven't been chillin' on my ass for over a year."

Emily puts on a mock-shocked look, inside she's delighted, no one's teased her about the accident before. Before she gets up, she leans towards Paige and places a chaste kiss on her cheek. Standing up, she turns to go into the cabin.

"Night, Paige."

"Night, Emily."

**XXXXXX**

On the bus on the way home, Paige thinks she can get away without performing too many 'captain' duties. Everyone's tired, the first weekend a physical shock, and Brennan's made sure she's worked them hard. Her philosophy is to let them know what level of training and intensity she expects of them from the outset. And it's a philosophy she expects them to continue throughout 'dry' month in the coming weeks, that same intensity in the gym and with the weights as they've had to show this past weekend. So Paige figures for today at least, she's got a pass to allow her to sit back and relax. She's positioned herself near the front of the bus, so she can see Brennan if the coach needs anything from her, and close enough to the rest of the girls if they want to talk to her, but they're pretty subdued for now. She's got her headphones in and her shades on. With a more subtle turn of her head, she can see Emily out of the corner of her eye. Every now and then something outside catches her eye, but mainly she's listening to music. After a couple of hours she becomes intrigued about what Emily could be listening to. She gets up and slowly walks to the front of the bus, careful to ascertain whether Emily is asleep she lightly presses her shoulder. Emily turns, smiles and takes out one of her earphones.

"Hi." She motions for Paige to sit down next to her.

"Hey. How are you? Feeling the effects of the weekend?"

Emily widens her eyes in mock-horror. Paige chuckles.

"You're doing well, the rest of the team is out for the count."

Paige motions behind her and Emily takes in the mainly sleeping faces of the girls behind her. Only Hersh and Narcizo are chatting, quietly, the rest asleep or staring quietly at the scenery going by. Paige settles into the seat, she looks over at Emily's ipod.

"Just wondered what you were listening to."

Emily sighs and rolls her eyes,

"Oh God. Are we gonna get competitive over music now? 'Cause I assure you I'll lose." Paige laughs with her,

"No, no, not competitive. I'm just curious. C'mon let me have a listen."

"Sure. You wanna swap?"

They exchange headphones, after a few minutes, Paige indicates to Emily she wants to talk.

"Not bad, Fields. You like some pretty cool stuff."

"You sound surprised."

"I am. I thought you'd be all Katy Perry and Taylor Swift, not the xx and Daft Punk." Paige remembers something, hesitates, then asks, "Look, Holden and I are gonna see the xx in a couple of months if you wanna come?"

"And Holden is?"

"My best friend. We've known one another forever. He's got our tickets already, but he won't mind getting another one."

"Is he the guy I saw you with when I was having my interview with Coach Brennan?"

Paige smiles,

"So, you _do_ remember. Yeah he is. He can be a jerk sometimes, like most guys, but he's cool." She leans closer to Emily, drops her voice, "to be honest, I love him to bits." She leans back into her seat, raising her voice again, "so, what do you say?"

Emily considers, she hasn't been to any concerts since her accident, beforehand she'd always enjoyed them. She thinks back to the conversation she had with Donnelly, about there being a 'before' and an 'after', considers that maybe she was wrong. She shakes the morbid thoughts out of her head, it would be something to look forward to.

"Sure, why not. Do you think he'll mind getting me a ticket? I'll give you the cash to pass on to him if you like."

Paige is unaccountably pleased. She grins,

"Nah, no worries. Just pay him on the day, he won't mind."

They settle back into their seats, re-plug themselves into their music as the time passes on the journey back to campus. Paige hadn't thought about it much, until a jolt in the road presses her into Emily and she feels the contact of skin on skin and she shivers slightly. Unsure what it means, she shifts a little in her seat to put some more space between them, she takes a quick look at Emily to see if she's noticed, but she appears to have fallen asleep and doesn't react.


	3. Chapter 3

**Thanks again for reviews, much appreciated, I'm glad people are enjoying the story, hope you continue to enjoy. For the record _cwtch_ is a Welsh word, which means 'fits into the space'. It was originally the word for the space under the stairs (so Harry Potter lived in the cwtch at the Dursley's), but it's a lovely word - warm and comforting.** **So, Chapter 3 - some surprises and some stones in the road, maybe?**

The next couple of weeks pass in a blur for Emily. Her body's getting used to the daily wear and tear of training every day. Coach has her on a full-on schedule, she's training twice a day and has started her diet. The weights are doing her good, she can feel her body changing, can feel her muscles responding, she's becoming strong again, lean. And it feels really, really good. Until she has to shower. When she showers she looks down at her battered and broken body and remembers. The scars are there forever, less red, though still raw-looking, winding their way down her body like ivy choking an oak tree. She hangs back in the gym while everyone else goes to shower so she can get into the locker room last, be on her own so no one has to see her, be repulsed by her.

Classes have started and she's finding her way around campus with ease now and she's beginning to make friends with some of the girls on the swim-team, some from her classes. She's always been open, easy to get on with, but she's a little different now. She doesn't let them in. She's friendly, polite, like she's been brought up to be, but it stays on a level that she's comfortable with. She's not thinking about swimming, not yet, thinks she'll deal with that when she's face to face with it.

At the weekend of the first week after camp, Spencer surprises Emily with a dinner-date. She's invited her round for a meal. Emily's pleased, even excited, she's been wanting to meet Spencer's boyfriend, Ethan, since she first found out about him a couple of years ago. She's less pleased and excited when she realizes she's been set-up.

As Spencer opens the door, Emily can sense Spencer's up to something. She's grinning far too happily and is fussing around far more than usual. Emily's uncomfortable.

"Ok, Spence, what's up?"

Spencer feigns ignorance,

"What? Nothing. I'm just happy you're meeting Ethan is all."

Emily scowls at Spencer,

"Na-uh. You don't get away with that. What's going on?"

"Ok. Well." And Spencer looks really happy, giddy almost, "you remember I mentioned my friend, Dani?"

Emily sighs and turns away from Spencer, anger flashes in her eyes,

"Spence, I _told_ you. I'm not interested in dating."

"Ok, Em. Who said anything about _dating_? I just want you to meet." She huffs in frustration, "plus it may get you off spending so much time with Paige freaking McCullers."

Because it was true, Emily has been spending a lot of time with Paige. It's kind of inevitable, they train together every morning and because Paige is captain, she's always last out of the locker room. And because Emily waits until everyone has gone from the shower room until she showers, she and Paige often end up leaving together. It also seems inevitable that this leads to breakfast most mornings. Emily feels good around Paige, feels like herself, the part of herself that some other people don't get to see: the competitive Emily, and also the slightly broken Emily. Because sometimes she's so exhausted after the gym that she can't hide how she's feeling. And then she gets scared, scared of opening up of releasing what's inside her – the fear, the terror, the fact that she hasn't slept properly since the accident, the disgust at her own body that she never wants anyone else to see. The darkness that she carries inside her now that she can't ever show anyone. But Paige doesn't seem to flinch from it.

"You know, for one, you need to get off her back because this is getting _old_ Spencer. And for another, I _don't _need you to organize who I am and am not friends with."

It's into this rather tense space, with Spencer and Emily glaring angrily at one another that Ethan enters, with Dani, whom he met at the door, waiting to come in. Emily gives one last humph in Spencer's direction and turns to meet them. She's surprised when she sees Dani, she was expecting someone (if she'd admitted it to herself) more like Paige. Dani's completely the opposite. Her blonde hair is cut to her shoulders. Her smile is honest, direct and her gaze is open. Emily relaxes, she recognizes in Dani someone who won't challenge her. Plus, she's really, really pretty. Emily smiles back at her and extends her hand in greeting,

"Hi, you must be Dani. I'm Emily."

"Hi, Emily."

The meal is lovely, Spencer cooks as she does everything, as if her life depends upon it, and with that thought, Emily allows herself a wry chuckle that if she and Paige could work out their differences, they'd realize they're actually pretty much alike. Conversation is good, Ethan is a match for Spencer, he's whip-smart and funny and Emily finds that she likes Dani. She seems like she has no edges and like things are pretty straightforward for her and Emily admires that. As the evening draws to a close, Emily remembers she has an early practice and after saying her goodbyes, gets up to leave. She's halfway out the door, when she hears a voice calling her name,

"Um, Emily?"

Emily turns, sees Dani standing in the light of Spencer's hallway, she smiles,

"Look, I know this is really awkward and everything. But, um, I wondered if you'd like to go out sometime. Just us. No pressure – from Spencer, or anything."

And Emily's about to answer, 'No, no thanks,' but something in her gives, bends a little, she nods,

"I'd like that." She roots around for her phone and takes Dani's number, giving her a smile. As she turns to leave again, she feels a hand on her arm and turning, in surprise, feels Dani's lips on hers, gently barely there. Dani smiles and walks back into the house.

**XXXXX**

Gym sessions are ramping up in the last weeks of dry-month. Paige and Emily train pretty much together. Emily's lifting weights much heavier than she could manage at the beginning of the month and due to Paige's summer regime she's pretty much the only one who can spot her now. They're on their way back to the locker-room, shoulder to shoulder as Paige bumps her arm into Emily's,

"Hey, so, you're looking pretty good now, Fields."

Emily laughs at her,

"Yeah. I dunno, I _feel_ good. It feels like it's coming back. The diet Coach gave me, the weight program. Like I'm finally shifting some of this excess."

"Well, you were hardly _obese_, Fields. But yeah, you know, you're looking good." And Paige feels her face redden, her voice crack and she has to look away from Emily for a moment. She clears her throat and hurries into the locker room, murmuring "Um, Hersh wanted to see me for something" leaving Emily looking puzzled behind her.

Paige breaths heavily into her locker, momentarily resting her head on the cool of the metal, mentally berating herself, _what the hell was all that about? What is wrong with me? You tell your team-mates all the time when they're looking good, fitter or stronger_. She rubs her neck with her hand and shakes her head. She puts it to the back of her mind and heads off to the shower. She thinks momentarily of giving breakfast a miss, but decides that would be even more weird.

Over breakfast, Paige is listening to Emily chat about her family, her dad in the army, her mom in Rosewood. It sounds idyllic and Paige bristles a little, until she catches sight of the scar running down Emily's wrist. She has an urge to just reach out and touch it, see how it feels, how Emily would react. But she does nothing, instead she changes the subject, onto what she thought was surer ground,

"So, back in the pool next week, Fields."

Paige didn't expect Emily's reaction to be so dramatic. Emily stiffens, her eyes shift, unable to hold Paige's. Paige reaches across, takes Emily's hand, squeezes it gently,

"Hey, hey. I didn't mean to upset you, Em, I'm sorry."

Emily's breathing heavily, doesn't want another panic attack, not here in the canteen with everyone around, not in front of Paige. She breaths again, forces herself to look at Paige, tries to smile,

"Yeah. I'm ok."

"Haven't you been back in the water since the accident?"

Emily breaths out heavily, shakes her head, smiles a little wryly at herself,

"No. I guess I've been trying not to think about it."

Paige bites her bottom lip, realizes she can't let Emily's first time in the pool be next week in front of everyone.

"Ok. Look, I've got keys off Coach Brennan. What d'you say we have a swim on the weekend? Just you and me?"

Emily looks at her, gratefully, she nods her head,

"Yeah. That would be good. But, am I stopping you from doing anything?"

"What me and my crazy social life? Don't worry about that. I'll cope. What about Friday evening?"

Emily smiles, just about to agree, before she remembers she's got a date with Dani,

"Oh, um, I'm busy Friday. How about Saturday morning?"

Paige nods,

"Ok. Sounds good."

Emily hasn't told Paige she's seeing Dani. She decided not to for the first couple of weeks they were dating, it didn't seem worth it. Now it's been longer she feels like she should have said something sooner, and doesn't know where to start. She's not sure how Paige would react, Dani and her were a long time ago, but she might think it weird. And Emily feels uncomfortable talking about dating to Paige.

Emily thinks about Dani. It's good, so far. They get along. Dani's easy to be with. She's kind and thoughtful. Sometimes Emily thinks she's too thoughtful, she's never once asked about the crash, and steers any conversation away from loss and grieving, chooses films that are light and happy and don't feature dying or disasters. Sometimes Emily finds it comforting. Sometimes it's suffocating.

**XXXXX**

Paige is home, stretched out on the couch in the living room, one arm across her stomach the other covering her eyes. Coach is ramping up the training and today was a particularly hard session. Holden's making tea in the kitchen and Aria's watching Paige's dramatics with a wry smile. Holden brings the tea in and sets a cup on the floor by Paige.

"Hard session today, champ?"

Paige groans,

"Holden, things are hurting that I didn't even know I had."

"I seem to remember it's always like this at the beginning of the year."

"Oh, sure, but this time, I think it's worse. I think she's broken me."

Aria laughs and rolls her eyes,

"You know, you could be right, Paige."

Paige lifts her arm from over her eyes and glares at Aria,

"What d'you mean?"

"Well. Something's changed. You used to be a player, out every weekend, different girl every night," Paige goes to interrupt, but stops herself, it's not _so_ far from the truth, so she lets Aria get away with a little exaggeration. "Now look at you. You can't even move off the couch, you haven't been out all term."

"It's only been a month and a half, Aria."

"Yeah, but, I think you've lost your mojo."

Paige swings her legs off the couch onto the floor, mock indignation on her face,

"I'm insulted."

Aria waits a beat, sneaks a look at Holden, then softens her voice, drops the mocking tone,

"Seriously, Paige, we're actually a little worried about you."

Paige looks from one to the other,

"Really? Why?"

"'Cause, you're not going out. You're just training - or working. I mean, I'm glad you've stopped messing around, I was getting sick of trying to defend you all the time –"

"You didn't have to do that." Paige waits a beat, "not that I don't appreciate it."

Aria ignores her, waves off the thanks,

"You need to go out and have fun."

Paige thinks about it for a while, takes a sip of tea, then looks up with a grin,

"Is this just a way for you two to subtly say you want some alone time? 'Cause, I can totally handle it if it is?"

Holden smiles in response,

"Paige, I'm not denying _sometimes_ it would be nice to have the house to ourselves, but," he shrugs, "I do think you should go out sometimes."

"Is this part of Operation get Paige a girlfriend?"

He laughs,

"No. I promise."

Paige pauses a moment. If she's being completely honest she's not been going out since she had some kind of weird revelation that she wasn't actually _happy_ acting like she was. Since she realized that, for all Holden's teasing, she _was_ kind of jealous of what he and Aria had, that maybe she _was_ looking for something deeper; more connection anyway, than average sex and a couple of drunken dates. She smiles back at Holden.

"Yeah, I don't know. It just doesn't _feel_ right anymore." She shrugs, "I guess you're right. And I promise, just let me know when you want some 'alone time' and I will be out of your hair."

**XXXXX**

Paige has been thinking about this conversation for the last couple of days. She pulls out her phone and types _ Fancy a drink Friday night? Be good to catch up? Xx_ then pulls up a couple of names in her contacts and sends it out. A few minutes later she gets a response: _Hey P.! Long time no hear. Can't make Friday – out on a date (I know!) with the hottest girl on campus! Be good to see you. I'll text later. Dan x_ Paige gives her phone a curious glance, then yells,

"Aria!"

Aria's head appears from round the kitchen door,

"Paige? You ok?"

"Yeah. Um, you seen Dani lately?"

Aria huffs, cocking her head to give Paige a stern look,

"No. Why?"

"Just wondering." Paige sighs, Aria's look means she's not going to let it go that easy, "Ok, well, I sent a text seeing if she wanted to go out Friday."

"Paige."

"No. No. Not like that. Just to catch up." She sees Aria's look, she's disappointed, 'Honest."

"Paige, don't you think you've messed her around enough?"

"I swear, I don't want to mess her around. I just wanted to catch up." She shakes her head, "anyway. Look, apparently she's seeing someone, and I quote, the _'hottest girl on campus'_, which, come on, I'm right here" she spreads her arms wide, indicating herself, then goes back to her phone, "but, I just wondered if you knew what was going on?"

"I don't – I've not seen her for ages. And frankly? If she's seeing someone I'm really pleased for her – it'll stop her mooning round over you."

Paige laughs and rubs the back of her neck, musing over the text she climbs the stairs to her bedroom.

**XXXXX**

Early Saturday morning, Paige is trying to move quietly around the house. She doesn't want to wake Holden and Aria. She's had breakfast, changed into her costume and sweats and has her duffle bag with a change of clothes slung over her shoulder. It's a bright day, one of those last crisp, clear days of autumn. She pulls her shades on and grabs her bike, cycling to the natatorium on campus. Emily's already waiting when she pulls up. Paige watches her, unnoticed for a few moments, she's pacing up and down, it looks like she's talking to herself, one hand is balled into a fist, the other is holding her bag close to her side. As Paige stands up from locking her bike up, Emily notices her and gives a small wave. Paige raises her eyebrows as she walks up to her,

"Hey. You're early." She waits a beat, "or am I late?"

Emily smiles,

"No, no. I'm early. Sorry."

She breathes out rapidly and Paige glances at her, she notices she's unable to stand still and appears to be breathing deeply, like she's run here,

"Don't sweat it, Fields." Fiddling with the natatorium lock, she places a hand on Emily's arm, "chill, Emily. It's not a time trial."

Emily tries to smile back, but she's terrified and it's all she can do to keep it together, not turn around and sprint away. Paige gets changed quickly, leaves Emily to gather herself and change in her own time so she doesn't have to hide her scars. As she steps out pool-side, she sees Paige swimming a length underwater, watches her stretch and pull, easily finding a rhythm. She reaches the end of the pool near Emily, hangs onto the side pulling her goggles over her head and wipes some of the water from her face. She takes one look at Emily and confidently pulls herself out of the water, she stands close to Emily, both looking at the light streaming in from the high windows as it ripples on the water casting reflections around them which dance and spin with the movement of the water.

Paige gently lays her hand on Emily's arm again, says, quietly,

"Em? You ready?"

Emily can't talk, can't respond. She looks at Paige, eyes wide, lips curling back like an animal in fear. She steps backwards. Paige takes in a breath, steps back with Emily, grasps her arm more firmly and leads her to sit on the bleachers.

"Emily? Can you do it?"

Emily turns towards her, barely able to form a coherent sentence, Paige sees her eyes well up with tears,

"N-no."

"Ok." Paige nods, takes a deep breath, as much to calm herself as to calm Emily and to buy herself some time. "Ok. Do you remember the first time you went swimming?"

She gives Emily time to gather herself, watches as she desperately tries to pull herself together, wishing she could do something to help, terrified she's pushed her too far too fast, that she should have told Brennan what she was planning, scared she's going to push Emily into that dark place inside her. After a few moments, Emily finally faces her and nods, Paige notices a sheen of sweat has appeared on her forehead. Paige continues,

"Me too. Everyone thinks it was my dad who taught me to swim – if you met him," she laughs, deprecatingly, "my God, if you'd seen him during high school," she sighs, "well, _before_ he became obsessed with how my sexuality was going to shame _him_ and upset _him_" she glances at Emily, "Anyway, it wasn't him, it was my mom. She was so desperate for me to learn to swim, I think she'd seen _Don't Look Now_ when she was younger and she thought it would help." She sees Emily looking a little puzzled, "don't worry about it. So yeah, she spent a whole summer when I was 8 with me every day in the pool teaching me to swim. Just like she did when I learnt to ride a bike the year before. She'd put one hand on my back, one under my stomach" Emily watches as Paige's hands demonstrate how her mom held her in the water, "and would guide me to the edge, from deeper and deeper out. Of course, much like riding a bike when I'd think she was holding on, she let go without me noticing longer and longer until – here I am, superstar swimmer."

She laughs and turns to look at Emily, subtly checking that her breathing has returned to normal, the sweat has dried on her skin and her eyes are looking less wild.

"And after that, my mom used it as a way for me to have freedom, independence, she'd always let me go swimming. We'd go together every week, for years. And I loved it, I loved it so much, it became natural for me to start doing it competitively. But she never pushed me." She leans conspiratorially towards Emily, "that was my dad. But she always said, mainly behind his back, that I could give it up whenever I wanted and it was really important for me to know that."

She sighs, screws up her eyes, she feels like this is really important and she's trying to choose her words carefully,

"I guess what I'm trying to say, Em, is, swimming is something you do for _you_. Do you want to get back in the water? Or not? And if you don't, then, it doesn't matter, unless you're doing it for _you_, because _you_ want to. If you don't want to swim anymore, then, that's your choice. Because I think you could pretty much do anything you want to do." Paige nudges Emily's arm, "Hey, why not try out for field hockey – then you could kick Spencer's ass for me?"

Emily laughs at that, although she doesn't quite believe what Paige is saying, it all sounds too easy,

"But, what about my scholarship? What about Coach? What about my parents?"

Paige shrugs,

"Fuck 'em."

Emily laughs, slightly shocked,

"Paige!"

"No, Em. You have to do this for you. When was the last time you swam for fun?"

Emily shakes her head, unable to answer, Paige continues,

"I do this a lot. Get the keys from Brennan, because if I didn't all I'd have would be swimming for competition, and I don't want it to be taken it away from me. Because when I swim like this, I remember my mom, as we were then, and it gives her back to me a little bit." She sighs again, "Look, I know I'm never going to take this any further than College. I know I was never going to be an Olympic level swimmer and I don't know how that feels. I know it's different for you. But, but, actually, you're not so different from me now and you have to live with that. And maybe, as someone who is here, on this level, maybe I can help you come to terms with that too?" Paige shrugs, smoothes her damp hair from her face, shrugs, "Maybe that's what I'm here to do. Maybe that's my role."

"I – I don't know."

Emily looks around her. She shivers a little and Paige shifts to pull a towel from the bleachers behind her, she hands it to Emily who wraps it round her shoulders.

"What happened with you and your mom?"

"Oh. Coming out really, my dad a little, I guess. We kind of grew apart, she couldn't stick up for me against my dad and I really needed her to. Although, Holden reckons I'm too hard on her, reckons that it must have been her who stopped my dad from throwing me out."

Emily breaths in deeply, exhales slowly and turns, offering Paige a tentative smile,

"Ok then. Quid pro quo. I get in the water. You phone your mom, start to ease up on her a bit, stop giving her such a hard time. Seems to me like she gave you something really precious."

Paige laughs, shakes her head, secretly delighted that Emily's showing some fight, some spark, senses this is going to go ok after all.

"Ok Fields, so that's how it's going to go." Paige stands up, wrings some of the water from the ends of her hair, "You sure you're ok?" Seeing Emily's nod, Paige turns towards the pool, takes a running dive into the water surfacing, laughing, she turns to look at Emily, sees her watching her, Paige dives back down swimming underwater away from her. She feels and hears Emily dive into the water behind her and smiles triumphantly to herself. She lazily swims to the end of the pool and turns to watch Emily.

They swim for an hour or so. Paige trying subtly to check that Emily's ok, Emily more than aware of what Paige is doing, but something in her quite liking the care and attention she gives her. Paige makes sure to curb her naturally competitive streak, keeps the swim light, asks for some tips on her breast-stroke and by the end, Emily seems calmer, more relaxed, as if she's remembered somehow how the feel of the water can sometimes take your worries and your stresses and wash them away. She's sloppy in the water, not clean, not like before, but she figures she can work on that later on getting her timing and her rhythm back. For now, like Paige said, this is just about swimming for fun, remembering the feel of the water and letting her muscle-memory make the right shapes.

Paige hangs back when they've finished, letting Emily get into the shower first, aware of her anxieties about changing in front of anyone. Paige can kind of get why, she's seen glimpses of Emily's scarring, of the wheals on her body, enough to realize why she hangs back in the shower room, ashamed to let anyone see. Although Paige just sees it as a sign of her winning, her survival – wishes she could somehow tell Emily that, but knowing it's not her place.

Paige is sitting on the steps waiting outside, basking in the warm air, the sunlight on her back when Emily emerges from the natatorium. Paige notices her step seems lighter, she's trying not to, but she's smiling, looking pleased with herself. Paige stands up, bumps Emily's arm,

"Alright? You did great."

"Hardly Olympic timings."

"Yeah."

"Thank you."

"Come on, it wasn't much."

"It was everything."

Emily notices Paige go to say something sees a flash of something in her eyes, until she regains her composure, returns to joking,

"I just want you to help me get my times down - I've got an anchor spot to fight for. So, you want to come home and get something to eat at ours? Nothing much. We don't have much in, but actually, if we hurry, Aria and Holden may just be having something and we could steal some of theirs. Aria's a great cook."

Emily wonders for a moment whether she should, but can't see any good reason why not. She's got no other plans and she's intrigued about where Paige lives, about her relationship with Holden, which sounds to her like her own relationship with Toby, Spencer's old boyfriend when they were in High School and she realizes how much she misses him. She nods,

"Ok, sure."

"Yeah? Great."

When Paige opens the door to the little house on one of the small suburban streets surrounding the campus, Emily wasn't expecting to like it. But, she realizes after she's been there a couple of hours that she really, really does. It's warm, the walls of the sitting room which leads straight off the front door are painted a warm ochre and the couch and chairs are slouchy leather with throws and cushions scattered over. Most surfaces, including the floor are covered with cds, dvds or books, some for college purposes, others not. Emily notices it's clean though, and rightly surmises that it's Aria's job to keep a handle on the other two, who act more than anything like two teenage siblings, who love one another before and above everyone else and tease one another mercilessly. Emily notices the look of satisfaction that Holden gives Paige when Emily explains she's got to phone her mom and he promises that he'll make sure she does.

They managed to get back in time for lunch, Aria happily stretching the meal to accommodate an extra two hungry mouths. Emily's quiet at first, watching the interactions of three of them, as they tease, chat, argue and banter. She's intrigued by this Paige. She's used to swim-team Captain Paige, a mixture of authority and arrogance; she's even getting used to the Paige who she's spent some time with, the caring, kind, charming and supportive one; this one's slightly different again: happy, joking, but also fine with just sitting, listening and Emily realizes she'd like to get to know this one better. She's pretty sure not so many people get to see this Paige, she smiles when she thinks of how Spencer would react.

She ends up spending the evening there too. They've got a movie marathon planned and when asked, Emily can't think of anything she'd rather be doing than cwtching up on the battered brown sofa, covered in a blanket, eating take out and ice cream. She's never felt safe since the accident and it's the first night she has since then, comforted and comfortable in that messy room. She's only vaguely aware that she's fallen asleep when she hears Paige and Holden whispering over her, and a blanket gently pulled up over her, a soft hand pushing a strand of hair away from her face and being tucked behind her ear,

"Whipped, McCullers."

"Fuck off, Holden. We're not all you and Aria, you know. I'm just being a good friend, don't bust my ass over this. She's had a hard day, getting back in the pool and all."

She hears a swipe, a soft thud and a softer chuckle,

"Ow! Ok, ok. Sorry. Should we wake her?"

"I dunno. I vote we let her sleep. She lives in the dorm so she'll be ok here, we don't have to contact anyone or anything."

She hears footsteps lightly back away, guesses Holden is heading upstairs.

"Ok. Don't stay up long, Paige. You're cooking Sunday lunch remember?"

"Aww, shit."

She hears another chuckle as he retreats further away,

"You lost the bet!"

She's drifting into unconsciousness, aware of Paige tidying up around her, moving cups, bowls and stacking them up in the kitchen. Feels again, a gentle hand on her head, thumb moving over her brow, she knows she smiles as she feels Paige whisper gently against her ear,

"Sleep well, Em."

The following morning, Emily drifts slowly into consciousness with the sounds of coffee being made and light footsteps coming into the sitting room. She's aware of the couch dipping beside her, and a light hand being placed on her forehead. She feels the slight rough patch on the skin of the thumb, realizes it's from where Paige bites at it when she's nervous or worried about saying something and she wonders, momentarily when she even noticed that about her. She yawns and stretches and the hand is removed, she opens her eyes to a warm smile and a large mug of coffee (with the correct amount of cream) being placed in front of her.

"Morning."

Emily sits up slowly, looks around. The room's ochre walls are lit with the sunlight streaming through the blinds, little shadows and shapes are playing on the walls. She stretches, feeling the pull in muscles she hasn't used for nearly two years, rolls her head a little and takes a sip of the coffee.

"Ok? How's it feel?"

Emily hums a response, considering,

"Sore. But – good, actually, good."

She notices Paige smile,

"God, I can't even imagine not swimming for as long as you have. It's like, I have to be in the water at least once a week or I go crazy."

"Wow. Dry month must really kill you."

"Yeah. That's why I have a key. I promised Brennan I won't push myself too hard and she gave in." Paige pauses, waits a beat, "So, you slept ok?"

"Paige, you won't _believe_ how well I slept." She wants to tell her, about not sleeping properly since the accident, but doesn't quite know how. "I love this room. You were lucky to get this house."

She wasn't aware how close she and Paige were sitting until Paige gets up to go back to the kitchen and she finds she misses her warmth,

"I guess. It's not that great. You should have seen it when we signed for it at the end of last semester." She grimaces, poking her head from around the kitchen door, "But Holden and I spent most of the summer painting, doing it up. We found some of the furniture from skips that people were throwing out. Aria's mom had this old couch so we were lucky with that. Luckily Aria's pretty cool with this kind of stuff and she added the extra touches."

Paige disappears round the door again. Emily hadn't noticed the smell of cooking until now and her stomach growls. She figures she should get up and get home to make herself breakfast. Another yell from the kitchen,

"Em? You fancy pancakes and bacon and eggs for breakfast? I'm all set up and ready." She hurries past her to the foot of the stairs and yells up, "Hey! Sleepyheads! Breakfast! Come on, if you get in first you get first dibs. Holden's a pig, so grab what you want before he gets down."

Emily takes a seat at the large, scuffed and scratched oak table, facing the door. The kitchen is warm and comforting. Paige places a plate of food in front of her, as Aria and Holden shuffle in, grinning good mornings and nodding to Paige as they tuck in.

Breakfast is a more subdued affair than lunch the day before. They get a paper delivered and it's been divvied up so each has their own piece to read. The only sounds are the gentle purr of the radio, the scraping of cutlery on plates and the odd comment about what they're reading. It's different from anything Emily's known. At home, her mom never allows them time to sit before plates are cleared and table's wiped, and reading at the table is strictly forbidden anyway. Eventually, Aria stands up, addresses Paige,

"So, that was great. Thank you." She begins to clear the plates after putting on the coffee machine again, "Oh, Paige? Don't think this gets you out of making lunch though."

Paige huffs,

"Wouldn't dream of it." She looks at Emily, "Oh, um, you're welcome to stay if you like."

Emily would love to say 'yes', in fact, there's a part of her that would love to stay in the cocoon of the little yellow house, but she's aware that she's going to start outstaying her welcome soon. She feels like she should get back to her normal life, no matter how much she'd really like to stay in this one.

"I'd love to, Paige, but I've got stuff to do and I promised I'd see Spencer today."

Paige grimaces,

"Yeah, ok. Don't let Spencer down – especially not on _my_ account." She laughs. "Look, I'll walk you back if you like. I was gonna have a run today and I can get to the woods from campus." Holden clears his throat, about to chip in, Paige turns to him, "It's ok, Holden, I know, I'll be back for lunch." She rolls her eyes behind him, so only Emily can see.

Later, when Emily gets inside her room and shuts her door she suddenly remembers she hasn't texted Dani to tell her where she was and feels a little guilty that in all the time she's been with Paige, since early yesterday morning she hasn't even thought about Dani. She gets out her phone, pushing the idea to the back of her mind – of course I haven't thought about her, we haven't been together long. But there's something nagging, some unfamiliar feeling of guilt, but she tries not to dwell on it too long as she rings Dani's number and hears her voice answer.


	4. Chapter 4

**Again, many thanks for the follows and reviews. I wanted to write a multi-chapter fic and this seemed to fit, so I'm glad people are still interested in reading it. Some more Paily interaction, some angst. Hope you enjoy.**

For all Paige's hard work on Saturday, Emily's still a mess come Monday morning. She's hardly slept and has been up since 4 throwing up. She thought for a moment about shying away, calling it all off. She even considered calling her mom and telling her it was a mistake, she couldn't do it, she was going to walk away, from swimming, from College the whole thing. Then she thought of Paige's words, and she knew didn't want to lose the swimming and oddly she didn't want to let Coach Brennan down and she didn't want to let Paige down. She turns up at the natatorium a little later than the rest of the team. Walking down the hallway, she can hear the excited babble and chatter bounce off the walls of the locker room. She walks in, greeted on all sides, but all she can muster is a small smile back, hoping she isn't still a little green, hoping the sweat on her brow isn't standing out too much. She can't even open her locker her hands are shaking so much and it's a relief when another pair of hands reaches over and deals with the locker key,

"Chill, Fields." Emily looks up, meeting warm brown eyes, slightly crinkled with a wry smile, "just _chill_." Paige winks and stands up straight. She slips effortlessly into Captain mode, calling the team together to give the team talk,

"Ok, guys, listen up. First day back in the pool." She waits a beat and is rewarded with a few cheers, a couple of returning shouts of 'yeah' and carries on. "Back in the water and _this _year, you know what? I think we need to reward Coach for all she's done for us. Let's bring in Divisionals this year. Let's let Coach Mackay and his boys kiss our sweet asses." The team responds with cheers, whistles and cat-calls. Paige is pacing up and down, making sure everyone is included, her next turn takes her past Emily and she catches her eye and winks again making Emily laugh. "So - no slacking this year, Donnelly." More calling, Donnelly sticks her middle finger up, but she's smiling. "Alright, let's get changed, Coach is waiting. And remember girls," she waits a beat, looking round expectantly, and they all chorus together, "The body doesn't lie!" She waits for them to calm down, "So remember that – when you're out on your feet and you feel like you can't take another breath." She pauses, catches Emily's eye and drops her voice, "The body doesn't lie." She starts to clap and the girls join in, slowly filtering away to their lockers to change, pulling on suits, tying back hair.

She drops to the bench beside Emily,

"You ok?"

Emily nods, leans forwards resting her head in her hands, then sighs,

"No. I've been throwing up since 4."

Paige makes sympathetic noises and rubs Emily's back gently.

"I'd offer to talk to Coach for you, but I think you gotta do this, Emily. Let this one go and you'll never get back." She waits a beat, "unless you don't want to?" She tries to catch Emily's eyes, but she won't let her, afraid if she does the tears she's just about holding back will fall. She takes a deep breath,

"No. No. I'm good. Just –" she looks at Paige, "give me a minute?"

Paige nods, gets up and starts hustling the girls towards the pool. She gives a last look back to Emily who smiles in return and then heads out towards Coach Brennan. Brennan turns to her expectantly,

"Everything ok?"

Paige breathes a long breath out,

"Yeah. I think so."

"Nothing I should know about?"

"Um, I'll let you know."

"Fields ok?"

Paige nods uncertainly, breathing out a long sigh of relief when she spots Emily, stepping out from the locker room a beat behind the others, then lining up alongside the other girls at the side of the pool. She looks at Coach who raises her eyebrows,

"Yeah, she's ok."

That day and for the rest of the first week, the second week and most of the third, Emily's still sloppy in the pool. Much as she's actually enjoying the feeling, she can't find her rhythm, the reach and pull, the timings that come when you're on top of your game and it's frustrating as hell. She's recording ok times, especially compared to the rest of the team and when she talks to Coach Brennan she seems really happy with her progress. But still Emily's frustrated with herself.

And then, all of a sudden, and only for a moment but definitely there, towards the end of the third Thursday morning practice session it's there: the perfect sway, the rock and roll, the reach and pull, the feeling that it all comes together in perfect harmony and grace. She touches the end of the pool, whips off her goggles in triumph, not realizing that the rest of the team noticed it too. As she hangs onto the edge of the pool a spontaneous clapping begins, led most enthusiastically by Paige, she notices, and Coach Brennan kneels down beside her,

"There it is, Emily. There it is."

And Emily, breathless, ecstatic, can only breath back,

"Body doesn't lie, Coach."

"Sure." She smiles at her triumphantly, then turns to glare at the rest of the team, "Ok, I'm not sure what the rest of you think you're doing, but it's hardly time trials yet, and most of you are well off where I need you to be. Back in the water, swim down. Not you, Emily, I'd like to talk to you."

But Emily catches her look to Paige, her nod and the smile on her lips and is aware that she didn't shut the clapping down immediately. She pulls herself up from the water, wiping her face and Paige hands her a towel and a triumphant smile,

"Way to go, superstar. Told you you'd get there."

Emily grins and pulls Paige into a hug, whispering into her ear,

"Thank you."

"It's all you, Em, all you."

But Emily doesn't believe that because she and Paige have developed this routine, every Saturday morning, they meet up at the pool, early, swim for a couple of hours and then go back to Paige's for lunch. Paige keeps their time in the pool light, when she can see Emily getting frustrated she either calls a stop to their session or asks her some question about college - anything other than swimming. She doesn't let her think about her technique about how things were before, just lets her swim and enjoy it.

And that day, that Thursday morning, Paige is thrilled for Emily. She's standing with Coach Brennan, they've been discussing whether to send Paige to have a massage – she's been feeling a little pull in her shoulder and isn't sure if she should push on through or rest it, when she notices the shift in Emily's swimming. She stops talking, moves instinctively closer to the pool watching her intently. She suddenly recognizes in Emily's strokes what she knows Emily's been looking for. Once Emily's finished her lap she steps forward and unconsciously starts applauding; then moves forward to help her get out of the pool, where she hears the exchange between Brennan and Emily. As Emily pulls her into a hug, Paige can't help a surge of, what she can only describe as _happiness_ rush through her. At that point, she can't work out what it means, can't understand it's significance, just knows that she's happy, that it means so much to her that Emily is happy, that this is working for her and that she knows that she's made a difference, she's helped.

**XXXXX**

Emily has a date with Dani Friday afternoon. They go out for coffee and then an early evening movie. Dani is receptive to the fact the Emily has to be up early for training and that Friday is a double-practice. She sometimes seems to know more about Emily's routine than Emily does and although Emily finds it endearing, it irritates her too.

Sitting over a hot chocolate for Dani and a green tea for herself, Emily tries to talk to Dani about what happened earlier that day,

"Oh, I had a great practice today."

"Yeah? How?"

Dani is decidedly unsporty, can't see the point of most sports, and is only half interested in Emily's practice times,

"It's hard to explain, I kind of got my stroke back."

"Oh. Good."

Emily grimaces at her own excitement, tries to explain even in the face of Dani's decided non-enthusiasm,

"Yeah. Since the accident," she notices Dani shift as if she's in some discomfort, but ploughs on, "I haven't been able to swim as _freely_ as I did before. It's hard to explain, there's a groove, a rhythm you get into and I haven't had that since then. At least not until today."

Dani tries,

"Great. That's good, right?"

Emily smiles at her, takes her hand and strokes her thumb over Dani's fingers,

"Yeah. That's good." She sighs, "It just means I should be on for a place on the team and that all the training is paying off. I guess it means it's good for my scholarship too."

Dani smiles,

"Well, that I _do_ understand, 'cause that means you get to stay here right?"

Emily pushes her hair back from her face,

"Yes it does. Why, is that a good thing?"

"I'd say it's a very good thing."

Emily feels like she's being unfair to Dani sometimes. She knows Dani likes her, but she's uncomfortable with her own feelings for Dani, sometimes she knows she's using her as a way of assimilating herself back into society. That somehow after the accident, she didn't know how to _be_ around people who hadn't been through what she's been through, that she felt as if there was a moat between herself and the rest of the world, or a concrete wall that no one else could see. But Dani has a way of coaxing Emily out of her isolation. They spend a lot of time with her friends, very little on their own, Emily still shies away from allowing too much physical contact, she's still too aware of her scars, the broken nature of her body terrifies her and she doesn't want anyone else to have to deal with it. She's seen the way Dani's eyes shy away from the scars on her arms. She notices with a pang how when she accidentally touches them, she pulls back as if burnt, but Emily can understand it. Even her mom found it hard to look at her when she first got home from the hospital in those first few days of recovery.

She knows the girls on the swim team are aware of the mess that her body's in, but it feels different with them. Their world is the body, their every day existence is a struggle with their own body, how far they can push it, how much will it hold together? So, their obsession is with their _own_ bodies, they don't have time for hers as well. She's aware that most of them have seen her scars by now, she's heard Donnelly making snide comments, that (she smiles when she thinks of it) were _very_ quickly and very aggressively shut down by Paige, but she knows that they ignore them, because to accept them, to confront them means confronting the potential of their own bodies' failures.

She knows, instinctively too, that Paige is different, and much as she's empowered by that knowledge, she's also terrified of it. Terrified that Paige is the one person who could touch her, feel the scars and understand. Some Saturday nights, some Sunday mornings, because she's stayed over on the battered leather couch more than a couple of times now, she leaves the comfort of the warm, yellow-roomed house and stands outside for a moment, willing herself to turn around, to walk away, to not run back in, stand before Paige and tell her. Tell her, how she wants Paige to hold her, talk to her, make her laugh; how she fears her, how she scares her so much because she knows she understands her, that they share things, that Paige terrifies her because she could look into Emily and bust her wide open. Tell her that she's not ready for that yet, that she has to become whole again by herself so she can meet Paige as an equal, not as a small, broken thing. And that that's why she's with Dani for the moment and why she has to live with that guilt and deal with it in her own way.

**XXXXX**

A month after Emily's triumph is the night of the first meet. Paige is pumped, she believes this year that they'll take the Divisionals, they should certainly make the Finals. She wants this for herself, as Captain, but also for her Coach, for all she's done for her and helped her. And she wants it for Emily too. She can see how much it means to her – can see what it meant to her, that, compared to anyone else she's ever swam with, she's used to winning and she loves winning. Emily's naturally competitive with others, but also with herself and she's raring to go to test herself, now she's got her sway back. But Paige is also worried about this, worried that her timings are way off where they were before the accident and that Emily will be crushed by this. She's tried talking to her about it, but she's brushing off Paige's concerns.

Emily's told Dani she doesn't want her to come to the meet. Partly she does it for Dani's sake, realizing that Dani would only come to be the supportive girlfriend and isn't really interested; partly, it's for herself because she doesn't want to have to worry about exposing herself and her growing feelings for Paige, because she's worried that if Dani watches her too closely she'll see, she'll understand that her feelings for Paige are as clear as a vapour trail in a summer sky, to someone who knows what to look for.

So Dani has just walked Emily to the locker room, she leans in to kiss her goodbye and when Emily looks up, she sees Holden watching them. He looks uncertain, goes to walk past, then smiles guardedly at her, Dani suddenly sees who it is and cries out delightedly,

"Holden!"

He walks slowly towards them,

"Hi Dani." He nods at Emily, giving a tight-lipped smile, Dani doesn't seem to notice,

"Holden, this is my girlfriend, Emily."

But Emily can't be so dishonest,

"Hi, Holden, Dani, we know one another – Paige's best friend, remember?"

Dani rolls her eyes at herself,

"Yeah, of course. You here to watch the meet?"

"Oh, yeah, loyal as always."

The word makes Emily flinch a little,

"Ok, well. I'd better get going. I'll see you tomorrow, Emily?"

"Sure. You know there's a party after the meet right? So I may be a little worse for wear."

Traditionally there's a party after the first home-meet of the season, tonight it's at Paige and Holden's.

Dani leaves with one last kiss for Emily, waving at Holden she disappears. Emily and Holden are left. He looks at her quizzically,

"Um, I didn't know you and Dani were together."

"Yeah - a couple of months now."

"Good, that's good. She's nice."

The atmosphere is unbelievably awkward. Emily just wants to leave to head for the comforting sounds and smells of the locker room, but she feels guilty as hell for some reason, feels that she has to explain herself to him, to Paige's best friend.

"Yeah, she is. Um, Holden, look, could you not mention you've seen us to Paige."

"She doesn't _know_?"

Emily shakes her head, she can feel his disapproval, and then she feels a sudden indignation, why should she know? Why is he making her feel so guilty, there's nothing between her and Paige and she can date whomever the hell she wants.

"No. And I'd appreciate if you wouldn't tell her."

"I guess. But I think that _you_ should."

She looks down at the ground, knows he's right.

"Ok. I will. I promise. Just not yet. Not before the meet."

Holden lets it go, gives her a nod, wishing her luck for the meet and leaves to find Aria. They take their place on the bleachers, Aria becoming aware that Holden's in a weird mood, until she has to ask,

"Holden, what's up?"

He's torn, he's promised Emily he wouldn't say anything to Paige, but he feels like he has to discuss what he's seen and what it means.

"I just saw Emily and Dani."

"Oh, how's Dani? I haven't seen her for ages."

"No, Aria. I just saw Emily _with_ Dani."

Aria suddenly gets it, widens her large brown eyes,

"Oh. Oh. I see. When did _that _become a thing?"

He shrugs,

"Not sure, Emily said a couple of months."

"Does Paige know?"

"No."

Aria lets go a long breath,

"You gonna tell her?"

"I promised I'd let Emily do it. But I want her to do it quickly."

"Yeah." Aria waits a beat, "Holden, are we thinking the same thing?"

Holden nods, looks disappointed, he loves Paige, wants her happy and knows that he's never seen her so happy, so much herself than when she's spending time with Emily.

"I think so. You think Paige likes her?"

"Have you _seen_ the way she looks at her?"

"Yeah. What do I do, Aria?"

He looks upset and Aria takes his hand,

"Give Emily time to tell her, let them talk it out, then let Paige rant and cry like you always do."

**XXXXX**

Emily walks into the locker room as if she's got a dead weight on her shoulders. She sees Paige at her locker and rather than, as she usually would, going up to her, she sets her bag down on the benches opposite. Paige turns, sees her and smiles, Emily turns her head away until she feels a warm hand on her arm,

"Hey, don't worry, you'll be fine. Look, we're so far ahead of these guys that even if you swim backwards and Donnelly took the anchor spot we'd beat them. It's a great team for our first meet."

Emily sighs, Paige thinks she's just nervous and she determines at that point to push everything else away. She's had worse to deal with before meets and she doesn't want to let herself down again. She'll deal with Paige and Holden and Dani later.

It's during the meet, specifically during the 200m breast-stroke that Paige recognizes what _her_ sway means. She's watching Emily blow the competition away when things seem to go into slow motion, she looks round at the crowd, her team and even her Coach watching Emily powering to a new East Coast record, and she feels it bubble up inside her, only managing to catch it, to swallow it down before it bursts out there in front of everyone: _I love you_. And she recognizes _this is what it is_, what she's been feeling, how it's been growing, almost from the first time she and Emily talked, certainly since the first evening at the retreat: that she's in love with Emily Fields. And it seems so simple, so obvious that she can't believe she hasn't known it before. So, for once, she _isn't_ the first to scoop Emily up into a hug, even though she's sure from the way Emily's eyes search her out by the side of the pool, she's surprised by that, because now she's recognized it, it makes everything obvious, colours it all. But she thinks she'll be ok, because she'll just tell her, tonight, at the party and it'll clear up any misunderstandings.

**XXXXX**

Later, at the party at her house, Paige spends the time in a feverish excitement. She's not sure how or when to tell Emily, just knows that she has to. The fact that she's basically hosting the party means that she can't find the right time to talk to her for ages, so it's not until late that night that she finds herself, too drunk and standing much, much too close to Emily at the bottom of the stairs. Being drunk helps. It means she can just stand there and look at Emily, because since she's realized what she's feeling she can't find a damn thing to say to her, because all she wants to say is _I love you_ over and over again. Something in her brain registers that Emily's slightly troubled this evening, but she puts it down to it being after the meet – it must be weird to have that adrenaline again after all this time and she's probably just not used to it.

After another pause in their conversation, Paige's eyes drift over Emily's neck and shoulders, the breath catches in her throat, she raises her eyes further until they lock with Emily's, she's watching her intently. Paige sees her sigh and take another gulp of her drink.

"Paige, I need to talk to you."

"Sure, here we are. Here _I _am." She knows she's babbling, she's drunk, she's confused, she's never had this before, never done this. Suddenly remembers there's something she needs to say to Emily too, something she needs to tell her,

"Em, today, in the pool, you were, amazing, awesome, just, beautiful."

She's not sure where to go from here, when someone drunkenly staggers down the stairs and knocks into her, sending her off-balance, and that, combined with her drunkenness means she takes a step forwards. A step that sends her into Emily, pushing her back against the wall, her reflexes have managed to send one hand to brace herself against the wall behind Emily's head. When she gathers herself she sees that Emily's far too close to her. She sees her look down at her lips and she thinks, _fuck it, just do it_, and she leans forwards, pressing her lips onto Emily's. She moves slightly forwards to regain her balance, brings the hand behind Emily's head to fist into her hair and her other hand finds it's way to Emily's hip. Feeling Emily respond to her kiss, she becomes more bold, moves her hand round Emily's back to pull her flush against her, runs her tongue gently over Emily's bottom lip and hears Emily moan into her mouth. She pushes closer, closer as close as she can, feels Emily lightly bite her lip in response, feels Emily's free hand move to cup Paige's face and her hand holding her drink snake round her back, her tongue pushes slowly into her mouth.

Paige's head is spinning, it may be the drink, but she's never felt anything like this. Never felt anything _so_ good, can't imagine ever wanting to break this feeling, until, suddenly, she feels Emily shift, stiffen and push her away. Paige staggers backwards a little until she's standing arms length from Emily. Emily's hand on her shoulder, unable to look her in the eye, she's babbling something, 'I can't I'm sorry, we shouldn't' and then she bolts for the door, through the crowd of people that Paige had somehow forgotten were there. Paige is confused, shakes her head to clear it a little and knows that she can't let Emily go, not now, not like this. She starts after her, only catching her up when she's halfway down the street. She calls after her, and Emily waits a moment before she decides to turn round.

Paige walks slowly up to her, notices she's crying and her world, that for the past couple of hours has been wonderful, slowly crumbles around her. She touches Emily gently on the arm,

"Em? I'm sorry. I shouldn't have. I didn't mean to upset you."

And Emily feels terrible, because she's made Paige feel guilty, made Paige feel like it's her fault, when she knows that she wanted it as much as her. Paige's gaze is clear, strong, she doesn't know what Emily's really like. Has fallen in love with someone who is so far from her ideal of what she is that it makes Emily angry.

"Don't. Just leave it, Paige. I'm sorry."

"What is it? Tell me you don't feel the same and I'll leave you alone. But you kissed me back, I know you did, I felt it. Tell me."

Emily breathes in: one, two breaths. It could be so simple. She could tell her how she feels, how she wants her, how she's all she thinks about. How when she thinks about her she smiles, how she feels so safe and warm in their house that she's not felt since way before the accident. How she feels like she's home when she's with Paige. But then she remembers that she doesn't deserve this. Doesn't deserve Paige or to feel like this. Not for being the only one to survive. Isn't worth the pain she'll give to Paige because she will, she's not ready, she's not ready to be broken open because she hasn't yet been put back together. She raises her head,

"I don't. I don't feel the same." And she hears rather than sees the breath leave Paige's body, sees the slump in her shoulders, the defeat in her eyes.

Paige turns away to walk back to the house. And Emily watches her go, thinks, _no, wait, come back and love me, __please, please love me, please don't leave me_. Until she hears the door to the little yellow-roomed house close and she breaks.


	5. Chapter 5

**Thank you, thank you for lovely reviews and follows. It's good to know people are enjoying. As I said things are more or less written, but I'm altering and tweaking as we go if I think it needs it. So, a bit more angst to come.**

Emily doesn't see Paige's posture change as she reaches for the handle on the front door. She doesn't see Paige's shoulders stiffen, her facial expression change into one of hardness, her eyes steel over as she pushes open the door to the house.

Paige feels broken, bereft. She feels betrayed, although there's been no 'contract' between them, no conversation, not even any intimation that either one feels anything other than friendship for the other, but Paige can't help feel there'd been _something_. Something that she's never shared with anyone else, some connection between them, things they'd shared that she's never shared with anyone. And she's angry and hurting like hell.

She shuts the door behind her, sees Holden coming towards her, can see in his eyes that he knows something, saw something but she can't deal with him now. If she does she'll break and she can't do that here. So when he reaches his hand out to her, she shrugs him off with a hiss and knowing her well enough he backs away.

Paige makes her way, with as much swagger as she can muster, towards the drinks table. Grasping the bottle of tequila, one of ginger ale and a couple of glasses, she turns to Hersh who's standing nearby,

"Hey! Lauren! Up for slammers?"

Lauren looks at her for a minute, and Paige waits a beat, terrified that she's been rumbled that the whole party witnessed her humiliation and is about to turn on her, then, Hersh smiles and takes one of the glasses, she grins,

"Ok, Captain. Fill 'em up."

It becomes increasingly hard for Holden to see what's going on as the people are thronging around the table to get a good look. Paige and Hersh are nearly at the bottom of the tequila bottle and Hersh is looking like she can't take any more. Paige grins, drunkenly, stands up and leans over the table. Hersh looks momentarily shocked, then smiles herself and leans forward into the kiss. The girls around erupt into cheers. The kiss carries on and on and the crowd grows quieter, moves away, until Holden can see that Paige has moved around to Hersh's side of the table. He doesn't want to cause a scene, but he wants to get to Paige. He grabs her by the arm and pulls her away as she comes up for air.

"Paige."

"What the fuck?!" She sees who it is and leans into him for support, still keeping one hand on Lauren's arm. She smiles, eyes just about able to focus, "Aww, Holden, come on. I'm just having some fun."

He leans close to her ear,

"Paige, what happened with Emily? I saw –"

But she cuts him off, pulling away from him, she steps closer to Lauren,

"Nothing! You saw nothing. Nothing happened. Go away. Just leave me alone."

Holden's known Paige for long enough to know he's not going to get any sense out of her in this state. He hopes, not very expectantly, that perhaps Lauren has some self control but decides to step away.

The following morning, Paige wakes with her throat raging, head pounding, body feeling like she's been in a fight. Contrary to her hope last night that getting as drunk as she possibly could would make her forget about Emily, it's the first thing that flashes into her head and she feels tears prick at her eyes. She shifts a little and bumps into warm skin. Groaning, she looks down at Lauren's tousled head sleeping soundly next to her. Paige has little recollection of much of the night past her fight with Emily, only that she drank. A lot. More than a lot. She's secretly quite pleased that she didn't spend all night with her head stuck down the toilet. She slips out of bed quietly, making sure she doesn't wake Lauren, noticing with dismay she's wearing nothing but the pair of girl-boxers she had on last night. She dresses as quickly as she can with a raging hangover, trying not to make any of the sudden movements that send a sharp, sickening pain to her head, even swallowing feels grainy, gritty in her throat.

Downstairs she slips into the kitchen where Holden and Aria are sitting, just finishing breakfast. The room is warm, cosy, usually her sanctuary. The smells of breakfast make her simultaneously hungry and nauseous. Both are reading the paper, both look up as she opens the door. Aria smiles and gets up,

"Coffee?"

She has to wet her lips to speak, nods,

"Please."

Holden folds his portion of the paper and looks at her,

"Alright?"

His voice is colder than usual. She sighs and slumps into her usual seat,

"Not really."

Her throat's raging and she feels unseasonably warm considering all she could manage to pull on were a vest-top and sweats. Holden shakes his head, she's worried he's mad at her, aware that he doesn't know much about what went on,

"No. Guessed you wouldn't be. So. Lauren still here?"

Paige groans and puts her head in her hands,

"Yes. Sleeping like a baby."

She glances at Aria and Holden, a little embarrassed, she used to do this all the time in her freshman year, after she and her high school girlfriend broke up, she'd get pissed, make out with someone, sometimes it would go no further, other times it would. But she's never had to face her friends in the morning, not in such close proximity and she feels like she's let them down. Paige sighs,

"I'm really sorry. I don't even know if anything happened I was so drunk."

"Yeah. I gathered that last night. I tried to stop you, Paige."

"Did you? God, I'm such a fuck-up."

Aria places a mug of coffee in front of her along with a plate of eggs. She gently touches Paige's shoulder as she goes past and Paige wonders what the hell is going on, by rights they should be bawling her out, but they're being incredibly supportive and she doesn't know if she can cope. She feels like shit. Her eyes prick with tears, but she holds them back. Holden says,

"Not a fuck-up, Paige. Look, I don't think you're interested in Lauren, you weren't last time and I don't think things have changed, but I guess you had a reason." He shrugs and rubs her arm sympathetically.

She snaps her head up to look at him,

"What d'you mean I had a reason?"

"Emily?"

"Oh."

"I'm sorry you had to find out like that. I don't know what she was playing at, but she sure as hell shouldn't have let you kiss her."

He sounds angry, not a usual state for Holden, and for a moment, Paige is about to retaliate, before she realizes he's not angry with her. She watches him for a moment, trying to take in what he's saying. It's not easy, her head is still spinning, although coffee and breakfast are helping.

"Find out what?"

"About her and Dani."

She laughs, her stomach makes a sudden lurch and she feels her already greying skin pale even more,

"What? Don't be stupid. I kissed her, she kissed me back and then ran out on me. She said she doesn't feel like I feel about her. It really fucking hurts, but," she waits a beat, "what the fuck are you talking about?"

Holden takes a deep breath,

"She didn't tell you?"

"What?"

Aria tries to stop him, but he needs to tell her. Holden's a great believer in the truth, he figures the sooner Paige knows what's going on the sooner she can start getting over it. He's got no loyalty to Emily, not now. And when Paige falls apart, he'll be there for her all the way. He knows she knows that,

"Emily and Dani have been together a few months now. From what she told me."

He watches her carefully, sees her eyes cloud then a sudden clarity, an understanding,

"She told you? Told you what? What are you saying, Holden?"

"I saw them together yesterday before the meet. I asked Emily and she promised me she'd tell you last night." He shrugs, "I assumed she had and that's why you were so upset."

Paige shakes her head carefully, clears her throat,

"N-no. She never said anything about Dani." She gives a small, self-deprecating laugh, "_Dani_? Wow. Karma really is a bitch, huh?"

Aria looks at Holden,

"I'm sorry, Paige."

Holden looks mortified,

"God, I'm sorry, I really blew that."

"Nah. It's not up to you to tell me. But …. Why did you think that would be reason to," she's lost for words for what actually happened last night, "do whatever happened last night?"

"Paige. I've known you since we were kids, you think I don't know how you feel about Emily? It's pretty damn obvious." He smiles, attempts a joke, "Plus, it's hard not to realise when you've got your tongue down someone's throat."

She rubs at her face, pressing her eyes, wishes for the world to just stop a moment and let her catch up,

"Shit. Does anyone have any aspirin?"

They've been sitting in silence for a few minutes when the door to the kitchen opens and Lauren's face pokes round the door. She looks worse than Paige, still a little green around the edges, face sweaty, eyes puffy. Paige looks up to the ceiling, then gets up and offers her a chair,

"Hey. Sit down. You want coffee?"

Lauren looks like she's going to puke at the thought. Aria's reactions are quicker than Paige's, she slops a glass of water in front of Lauren.

"Here."

"Thanks. God, Paige. What the hell were we thinking drinking that bottle of tequila last night?"

Paige laughs as much as she can manage,

"I know, right?"

Lauren looks at Aria and Holden,

"Hey. Sorry for crashing uninvited."

They both smile, say together, 'don't mention it', 'no big deal'. Aria lightly touches Holden's arm and motions to leave,

"Look, we'll leave you to it."

Paige slumps back down onto the table,

"I feel terrible. How about you?"

"Don't even ask. I can barely _speak_, Paige."

She nods, desperately wants to know what happened between them, but also desperate to put the whole thing to one side. She knows Lauren liked her at some part of last year, they hooked up a couple of times, but they got over that and have been friends since. Paige hopes she hasn't just taken advantage of her, hopes they can get back to friends.

"Um, Lauren? Last night…?"

Lauren lifts her head and smiles,

"Don't worry, your honor's safe. You were too far gone."

Paige breathes out a sigh of relief, then remembers how that might look,

"Sorry."

"No. Don't be. It's ok." She goes to say something, stops and then looks back at Paige. "I'm sorry about Emily."

"What do you mean?"

"Paige, you spoke to me for an hour about her. How you've never felt like this about anyone. How she kissed you, you kissed her, I don't know. I have vague recollections, but it sure as hell killed any mood for me, so…" She shrugs and Paige grimaces,

"Sorry. Look, don't say anything about Emily to anyone, please?"

"Sure. Secrets safe with me." She takes a sip of her water, color slowly seeping back into her face, "Hey,_ I _didn't even know she was gay."

Paige nods sadly,

"Apparently so."

**XXXXX**

Paige is lying on her bed mid-afternoon when Holden knocks at her door. He's kind of sheepish when he enters, for all that he thought telling her about Emily was necessary, he still feels awful about having to be the one to break it to her. She shuffles up to the top of her bed and sits up, surreptitiously wiping her eyes. Holden sits next to her, hands her a tea,

"Thought you might need this."

"Yeah. Though, really what I need's a bottle of vodka."

"Hair of the dog."

"Yeah. Hey, remember when we tried that when we were kids?" They both chuckle at the memory, until Holden sighs and takes a good look at Paige.

"How you feeling?"

"Shitty."

"I'm sorry." He watches Paige, unsure which way she's going to go - there are two options: anger or tears, he feels like he deserves both. "I didn't know what to do."

"No. You did right." She can feel the tears brimming in her eyes again, "When did you know?"

"Just before the meet."

"Ok. Look, I don't blame you." He breathes out a light sigh of relief,

"Oh, thank God. I promised her I'd let her tell you. But there was the meet and the party and then-"

"I kissed her. She fled. Yeah. I get it." Paige sighs and pushes her hair away from her eyes, tucking a strand of it behind her ear, "Come to think of it, just before I did she said she had something she wanted to talk to me about." She shrugs, goes to say something but can't and Holden sees her face crumple as the tears fall. He reaches round her and pulls her into him, hears her mumble something into his shoulder.

**XXXXXXXXXXXXXXXX**

Paige manages to make it into early morning practice on Monday, having spent the rest of Saturday and most of Sunday asleep in her room. She's coughing a little more and her chest is tight and her temperature seems to be higher than normal. She puts it down to tequila sweats and a little bit of guilt. As she steps inside the locker room, she's greeted by cat-calls and wolf-whistles, Donnelly leading it as she expected, she only has time to briefly catch eyes with Lauren before,

"So, McCullers, Lauren finally got you on your back?"

Paige gets into role, raises an eyebrow, puts on a shit-eating jock grin,

"Hey, I'm not saying anything, have to protect a lady's modesty."

There are further shouts, further lewd remarks that Paige manages to bat away, before her eyes rest on Emily, who's staring at her from the other side of the benches. Her heart sinks. Much as she's found out about Dani, much as Emily said she doesn't feel the same way, there's something in Paige that doesn't quite believe her – _can't_ quite believe her. She catches her eye but both look away, ashamed, embarrassed.

Emily tries to avoid Paige. She's upset by what she infers from the locker room, the gossip going round is that Paige and Lauren hooked up at the party, that Lauren ended up staying the night. No one seems to have seen anything that happened between her and Paige. She's hanging round in the locker room, taking her time, but still when she leaves she runs into Paige in the corridor. She looks up when she hears Emily approaching and Emily's shocked by how pale she is, she looks tired and worn out, and she's upset when she realises how much she wants to just put her arms round her and hold her.

They stand awkwardly in front of one another. Paige doesn't want to, but all she can remember is how her heart beat when they were kissing, remembers the feeling of Emily's lips on hers, her warmth and how she moaned. She puts the blush down to another hot flush.

"Hey."

"Hi."

"Is it true? You and Lauren?"

Paige passes a hand over her eyes. She's tired. She doesn't want this. She doesn't want to argue, but she's angry and she's hurt and she doesn't know how to handle what she's feeling.

"Oh, _please_."

"What?"

"Give me a break, Emily. Holden told me about Dani." She raises her eyes and all Emily can see is the pain in them, her heart twists,

"Paige. I-I'm sorry. I didn't know how to tell you."

Something in Paige snaps, breaks,

"Yeah, well. Perhaps you should have said something before you let me kiss you." She's all up in Emily's face now, spitting out the words, "Before you kissed me back."

"Paige, I didn't."

"Yes Emily, you _did_."

Of course, this is the point when Spencer shows up with Dani and sees Paige growling at Emily. She strides forward, pushing her away,

"Hey, you don't get to speak to her like that."

"Oh, _what_? You don't even know what we're talking about."

"Oh really?"

Paige sees Emily's face, can't do it to her. She swallows down her next comment. Turns away, says defeatedly,

"Yeah." Her eyes flicker to Dani, then back to meet Emily's as she says, "Hi, Dani. This the hottest girl on campus, huh? I'm really pleased for you."

Dani isn't sure. She and Paige have been friends for the past 18 months or so, but she's not sure whether she's taking the piss out of her, or whether she's genuine. She sees Emily, sees she's looking tired and decides she doesn't want to make it any worse for her. She knows she and Paige are friends, decides on taking it at face value and opts to calm the situation down.

"Thanks, I sure think so." Not knowing the situation, Dani steps forwards and takes Emily's hand squeezing it gently. Paige can't look, turns her head away, begins to walk away, off, anywhere, home. Dani calls after her, "Maybe we should go out for that drink sometime, catch up?"

Paige looks back at her,

"Yeah. Maybe you should text me sometime."

And she turns and leaves, Emily watches her departing back, sees the slump in her shoulders, the look of defeat. Wonders how someone with Paige's stature and poise can look so small and unsure. What she wants, what she _really_ wants is to call her back, to say to her, no, you're right, I kissed you back because I want you. What you feel for me, I feel for you. To say it all in front of Spencer, even in front of Dani, to show them how she feels about Paige. But she's too much of a coward. Because to be with Paige would mean to open herself up again, to open herself to losing someone who means that much to her. And she can't. She's not ready. So she lets her go. And doesn't speak to her for the next five weeks.

**XXXXXXX**

Paige is still feeling rough come practice the next morning and she's finding it hard to power her way through the water like usual. Her chest is still tight, she's subject to these hot sweats and she's coughing. Swimming through water becomes like swimming through treacle, she can' t make headway. She battles on through most of practice, until Coach calls her out.

"What's the matter, Paige?"

"With what?"

"With you, your times are way off this week. Look, I know something happened at the party on Friday. Is your form something to do with that, or is there something else going on? Are you unwell?"

Paige glares at Coach when she mentions Friday,

"No. Nothing. I'm fine." Then she meets the eyes of the woman who's been nothing but supportive of her since she's been here, who's put herself on the line for her on more than one occasion. She drops her shoulders, relaxes her stance, "actually, you know. I don't know. I can't get any power."

Brennan thinks a minute, she looks at Paige, she's not looking well. Her skin is looking pasty and her eyes are dull, a little bloodshot, she puts the back of her hand to Paige's forehead,

"You're burning up." She makes a decision she knows Paige isn't going to like. "Ok. That's enough for today. I want you out of the pool and no training, no weights this week at all."

Paige's face drops, tears prick in her eyes,

"Coach, please. I've got to get my times down for the next meet. Come on, I've got others up my ass for the 200, don't do this, please."

She's fucked up with Emily, now she's fucking up her swimming. This is one hell of a bad week. Coach can see how upset she is, but she needs Paige to be on her game for later in the season, a missed meet now isn't going to make as much of a difference as Paige thinks.

"Paige, it's not a punishment. I'm worried about you." Paige coughs as if to illustrate what Brennan's saying, "it's not going to hurt you to not swim for a week or so. Go to the infirmary, see what they say. That cough isn't good, Paige. You look terrible."

Paige huffs and turns her back, picking up a towel she makes her way slowly towards the locker room. She doesn't turn back. If she did, she'd notice Emily watching her go.

Emily continues with her practice, it's only at the end she steps up to Brennan,

"Hi, Coach."

"Emily. Looking good. You're really getting your form back now, you pleased?"

"Sure. I'm doing some different stuff in the gym, something I had a hunch on and I tried before…um, before, so I want to see if it works."

"You do that. And if it works you'll tell me?"

"Sure. I'll give you some tips." Emily smiles, "um, Coach? Is Paige ok?"

Coach turns to face her, quizzical look on her face; she crosses her arms,

"Something you want to tell me?"

"Oh, no. No. I just noticed her leave early."

"Ok, 'cause I've noticed you're not hanging round together so much this week."

Brennan notices Emily blush, decides not to push it today, but she doesn't like her two best swimmers being at logger-heads and she wants to shut down any arguments between them quickly.

"Ok. Well, she's not looking well. I told her to leave training this week. I don't think she's too pleased, but it's for her own good. I also told her to go to the Infirmary. If you want to help, you can try and convince her for me that I'm not dropping her from the team."

"Is that what she thinks?"

"I think so."

Emily smiles, wryly, knowing how that'll affect Paige and also knowing she probably let Coach know it too.

"I'll see if I can let her know."

"Thank you, Emily."

**XXXXXXXXXXXX**

Paige manages to persuade Holden to go to the Infirmary with her two days later, when she's feeling so rough that even she can't deny she needs to go. She's diagnosed with pneumonia. She's sent home to rest and given some antibiotics. Holden is charged with keeping a careful eye to make sure the symptoms don't worsen.

The next couple of weeks Paige spends in bed, her time spent between coughing and sleeping. Aria and Holden take turns looking after her, making sure she's warm, helping change her sweat-sodden clothes and keeping her topped up with fluids. They've informed Brennan and her academic tutor and both sent messages not to worry about anything apart from getting better. Some of her team-mates club together to send her a get-well card and Hersh and Donnelly and a few of the others make sure they phone a couple of times, they even call round to visit. In between sleeping, Paige scours the card to see if she can see Emily's signature, but it doesn't appear to be there, nor does Emily phone.

At the end of two weeks, Paige's fever breaks. That night, she's vaguely aware of the sensation that she's burning, clawing at her clothes for somewhere for cool air to get in. She can hear voices and at times can recognize them for Aria and Holden. She can hear the panic in Holden's voice, and Aria calming him down. Other times, she has little clue over where or who she is. Then, come the morning she knows it's over. Knows the fever is gone and that she'll be well again. As she becomes aware of sunlight peering through her curtains, the door opens and she sees Holden's head peek through. He's carrying a cup of some herbal tea, but he grins as he sees she's awake and aware, he sets the tea down on her bedside cabinet and leans in to hug her, Paige pats him weakly on the back, manages to cough out,

"Hey. Holden, don't crush me to death."

He lets her go and runs to the door shouting for Aria.

"Damn, Paige, that was a rough night. How are you feeling?"

"Honestly? Pretty rough. But I feel ok."

Aria steps into the room, leans over and hugs her tightly,

"Paige? How are you?"

"Better. Thank you."

She goes to say something else, but it's something she can't quite formulate yet, something about how she feels _different_. As if she's sharper, more focused, still her but yet, something's changed in her and it feels like it's changed her forever. She stops herself considering she's not quite formulated it for herself yet, it may just sound even more weird to them.

She spends another week recovering. When she finally gets to look at herself in the mirror she's shocked. She looks gaunt, smaller than before and she smiles at the irony that after spending a whole summer getting herself fitter, stronger, three weeks is all it takes to reduce her body to this. Her muscle tone gone, chest and lungs still ravaged by a deep cough, skin pale and paper-thin. And somewhere she acknowledges something (though nothing like) of what Emily must have felt after the crash – an understanding maybe of what makes Emily act like there's this wall between her and everyone else. Partially understands that thing that makes people uneasy around Emily is because they can never get close to what she's really thinking, really feeling, to what she's experienced. They can recognize the interiority of her that means they'll never get close enough to understand it. Paige is a little crippled to feel that she still wants to. Even after all this, even after not hearing a word from her whilst she was so ill, even after hearing about her and Dani, even after the night of the party, Emily is still all inside her head.

Holden is acting even more like a big brother around her, he won't let her go anywhere on her own, he's scared she's not strong enough. He even helped her shower the first day, terrified she'd fall and break something. After another week of this, Paige finally loses it and tells him in no uncertain terms to leave her alone. This finally convinces him she's ok.

Paige is worried about how her illness will affect her scholarship. She can't swim for the team, and she doesn't know how long it's going to be before she's anywhere near competing again. Coach Brennan has called each week to check on her and sounded pleased she was up and about and Paige knows she has to pay the call. She knocks softly on Brennan's office door, part of her willing her to be out, part of her just wanting to get it all over. When she's called in, Paige can't help but notice Brennan flinch as she looks at her,

"Pretty grim, huh?"

She tries to make light of it, but she's only spoken to Aria and Holden for weeks and they've got used to her. Brennan smiles and runs a hand through her hair,

"You sure you're better?"

Paige tries to laugh, but a splutter is all she can manage,

"Well, you should've seen me two weeks ago."

Coach assures Paige her scholarship is fine, she's spoken to her academic tutor and they've arranged for Paige to take some make-up tests in the New Year. She's only missed two meets so far and Coach has a training and diet plan all worked out for her. Paige looks at her, gratefully,

"Thanks. I was really worried."

"I guessed you would be. Paige, you're part of this team, you're the Captain, and I want you to feel like you still belong. I made Hersh and Emily co-Captains whilst you were ill," she notices Paige blanche and flinch a little at that, still not knowing the true state of things between her and Emily, she chooses to ignore it, "but I'd like you to resume Captaincy, even though you can't take part in the meets for a while."

Paige is delighted, she knows Brennan's doing her a favor, she grins her thanks. As she gets up to leave she asks,

"How's Emily doing?" Trying to keep her voice casual, but Brennan considers before she responds,

"She's ok, Paige. I think she's missed you though."

Paige thinks of the lack of calls, no signature on the cards and can't help a small scoff escape,

"Yeah. Well. I meant her times and stuff?"

"She's blowing the competition away, Paige. It's awesome. See, the body doesn't lie, she can come back from that, you can come back from a small illness like this, you'll see."

Paige smiles, thanks Coach and leaves.

It's another week before she sees Emily.

**XXXXXX**

It started out cold, but sunny, so Paige had the bright idea of taking her bike to College instead of getting a lift with Aria and Holden, which would have meant hanging around until her classes began, or catching the bus, which she rejected on account of everyone having germs. What she didn't consider was how tired she'd been getting after her illness, so by 3pm she's exhausted and still has to cycle home.

She's wheeling her bike across the quad when she sees Emily approaching from the other direction on her way home. Paige sighs.

For a moment, Emily forgets that they're fighting, or not speaking, or whatever it is they're doing and her heart does a crazy-stupid flip. Her instinct is to wave and run over, to tell Paige about her day, whatever's on her mind, just talk to her, to be with her. She smiles, then sees Paige's face and remembers and her heart shuts down.

As she draws closer, she realizes just how ill Paige has been. She's shocked at the paleness of her skin, her tired, drawn eyes and the lines around her eyes that seem more prominent as if they've been etched in in charcoal. She's skinny too, really skinny, her muscle-definition gone, she looks about half her body-weight. And Emily doesn't know what to do.

They stop when they get adjacent to one another. Neither knowing what to say, until Paige breaks the silence.

"Hi."

"Paige, hi. Um, how are you feeling?"

Paige bites back the urge to answer with a sarcastic quip, instead she runs a hand over her eyes, notices she's sweating even in this weather.

"Ok. Better than I was." She laughs, "I just really wish I hadn't been so stubborn as to try and ride my bike today though."

Emily returns the laugh, she pauses for a moment, then,

"You could leave your bike at mine and I could give you a lift?"

"Emily." She's frustrated, exasperated, why the kindness now?

"You look tired."

"I am." She glares at Emily. She hates that she feels vulnerable around her, that Emily has to pop up offering kindness and concern now. "You didn't phone. To see how I was. You didn't phone. Or call round. Or even sign the fucking card."

Emily can't meet her eyes, she looks round the quad. If Paige were able to see it, if she'd let her and if Paige let herself, she'd see that Emily has tears in her eyes.

"The whole _team_ signed the card. You couldn't even manage that?"

"I'm sorry, I meant to phone you. I was going to send you a card myself."

"But you _didn't_."

Emily looks down at the paved path,

"I know. I'm sorry."

And Paige hates herself for making Emily feel bad. Even though she knows she's justified. As a friend, even as just a _friend_ she feels she deserved something, some sign.

"Paige?" Paige sighs, "I didn't know what to say. I didn't know how we _were_. I should have signed the card, I'm sorry."

Paige shifts, shrugs, a gesture that Emily tentatively takes as forgiveness or a step in that direction at least.

"Can I do something now? Can I give you a lift?"

Paige's tiredness overtakes her stubbornness, she shrugs, says reluctantly,

"I guess. Sure."

Paige locks up her bike and they head off to Emily's car. The drive back is slightly uncomfortable. The time isn't right to talk about Dani and the kiss and what it all means – if it means anything, so they're making small-talk, mainly about swimming. Emily fills Paige in on the ins and outs of team politics, how her and Hersh have handled the captaincy. By the end of the ride, they almost see their way to an equilibrium. Paige slides out of the car and gives a small smile. As she moves towards the house, she hears Emily call her and she leans back in through the window.

"Paige? Can we just go back to being friends? I miss you. Please?"

Paige rubs her neck, she opens her mouth to answer 'sure, I'd like that', but somehow, it gets caught up,

"I don't know, Emily. I'll try, but I don't know if I can."

Her eyes meet Emily's, she looks a little shocked. Paige pushes herself away from the car and gives her a small wave goodbye, heading back into the house.


	6. Chapter 6

**Thanks so much for reviews and follows - they're so nice to get, it does make you feel like you're not writing into a void! This chapter contains more of Emily's pov - I hope it goes someway to an understanding of her. Plus this chapter is really, really long, wherever I tried to split it just didn't work, so buckle up and enjoy.**

Emily sits for a while in the car thinking about what Paige said,

"_I don't know if I can."_

She runs her hand over her eyes and grips the steering wheel of the car tightly, part of her is surprised she's as upset as she is. _I'm not going to cry. I'm not. Not here._ She shifts the car into drive, glances at the rear-view mirror and takes a deep breath as she heads back to campus. She meets the intersection where she should make her turn back into town, but instead she grimaces in determination and heads straight on towards the hills. Since her and Paige started training together, they often made time to run together out in the forests. She parks up in one of their usual spots and heads out of the car, she turns up one of the steep trails until she's climbing through the trees to one of their favorite rest spots, up above the city. She's relieved when she gets there to see she's alone, she doesn't want anyone intruding on her thoughts and she needs to think. She sits on the ground, her back to a tree.

What she does know is it's not working. Whatever she's doing isn't working for her anymore. She messing with Dani and it's not fair. She's messing with herself and it's not fair. She's hurt Paige and it's not fair. She thinks over one of her and Paige's first conversations, how something's shifted, as if the accident knocked her out of her timeline, out of her destined path.

She watches the sky darken and the birds swoop into the trees searching for somewhere to roost. She watches the flock of starlings above her flying around shifting shape from funnel to hourglass, thickening, thinning. And as she watches she thinks about her purpose, her 'path'. And in watching the wheeling and turning of the birds, she wonders if maybe this was her path after all, if maybe it was always destined for her to be here she just got there via her own twists and turns, her own way. She gets up, this time with purpose. Paige may not want to be friends, but Emily misses her. She missed her in the month and a bit she was sick and away from the team, the time they weren't speaking and she realises that the in all that time she spent with Dani, she never once misses her when they aren't together. Never once thinks about her when something happens, when she wakes up in the morning and when she goes to bed at night: it's only Paige. It's always Paige. As she dusts her hands off she reaches for her phone and composes a text.

**XXXXX**

"I don't understand. I thought we were ok?"

Dani looks down at her empty cup of coffee and looks distractedly round, looking anywhere in the room apart from at Emily.

"Yeah. We were. We _are_. But is that all you want? Ok? Is that it?"

Emily bites her lip, frustrated.

"But just like this? Out of nowhere. No arguments. Nothing?" Dani pauses,

"I need some time, to work some things out."

Dani clutches at the short straw she's been given,

"So, maybe it's just a _break? _Maybe you just need some time. I can give you time. We can take time."_  
_

"Dani." Emily breathes out a sigh in frustration, "I don't know. It just. It doesn't feel like it's working."

"For you maybe? It's working for me."

Emily raises her head to look Dani in the eye,

"Is it?" Dani tries to turn her head away, but Emily keeps eye-contact, "_Really_? Is it? You don't think maybe, maybe things should be different? Better?"

"Emily. Please. Just, let's have a break. See how you feel over Christmas. Just - a chance."

Emily doesn't answer. She can feel her resolve breaking. Dani's a good person. She deserves better than this and Emily's frustrated. She wants to tell her something more than this, but she knows the truth will just hurt her and Emily doesn't want her to be hurt.

"Please. Just wait. Until the New Year. See how you feel after the vacation. You're tired, you've been training all the time and competing and you're probably not used to it."

Emily's head snaps up to face her,

"Why?"

"Wh-what?"

"Why aren't I used to it?"

Dani squirms in her seat a little

"Well, b-because, you know."

Emily's eyes flash in annoyance,

"You can't even say it can you? You know, you've never once let me talk about the accident. You've never once asked me how it was, or how I feel about it, or how I am."

Dani looks away, murmurs something that Emily can't hear, "What?"

"I thought you wouldn't want to talk about it."

"Then why didn't you _ask_ me? It happened to me and I'm still getting over it and I need to talk about it."

"Then do. Talk about it. I'll let you. Please. Just don't do …._this_."

Emily's tone softens as she says,

"I don't think you really want that."

Dani slumps into the chair, an air of defeat. She nods and gets up and gathering her phone and purse together, she slips on her jacket. Dani turns away to go, then spins back, "Please, at least give me until after vacation, just say you'll think about it."

Emily nods,

"Sure."

**XXXXX**

Paige has yet to start back pool training after her sickness, but in-between following Coach Brennan's training plan and trying to cram for make-up tests, she's pretty flat out until the end of term. Usually she'd be moaning about going home for _any_ time over Christmas, but she's been phoning her mom more and she's looking forward to spending some time at home before she heads off for the New Year. Paige and Holden are driving home on Christmas Eve, Aria having left a few days before.

Christmas Eve morning and Paige realises she needs to get some last minute presents and provisions from town. Holden wants to be off soon, there was light snow in the night and he doesn't want to be stuck on the highway. She's sliding her way through the wet sidewalk when she passes the White Dog cafe. As she slips past she takes a look through the window. It's brightness contrasts with the gloom outside, the windows are fogged up, but she thinks she can make out someone waving at her. Figuring it's one of the swim-team, she pokes her head around the door,

"Paige! Hi."

"Emily."

As she makes her way over to the table, she rolls her eyes at the irony, and how she was stupid enough not to realise that the universe just wants to fuck with her one last time before she goes home to her parents'. However, she sits, then smiles as the waitress comes over to pour her a coffee,

"Thanks, Elaine."

"No problem, lovely."

Emily sizes Paige up through this exchange and her walk to the table. She looks stronger, fitter. She's getting some colour back, although that may just be a flush from the cold, but she doesn't think so.

"How are you, Paige?"

"Better. Getting stronger. Coach has me on this high-protein diet to build up my muscle and a pretty intense training program. I'm working in the weight room a lot."

"Good. That's good. Did she say when you can start back in the water? When you can start training again?"

And Emily wants to add, _because I miss you, it isn't the same without you_. But she swallows it down.

"Um, well, I've started light running which Coach reckons I should keep up over the vacation, just upping the intensity a bit, you know?" Emily nods, "and then, probably back in the pool at the beginning of term."

"Ok. Guess you're going mad being out of the water for this long?"

Paige cocks her head and smiles, the first genuine smile she's given Emily for weeks.

"Guess I am."

They sit in silence for a while. It's companionable, not tense, which is a miracle considering. Emily _wants_ to say something. She wants to make amends, although she's not sure how to or what to say. But Emily wants to get past this, she needs her as a touchstone in her life. Emily eventually clears her throat,

"So, you looking forward to the vacation?"

Paige laughs,

"I am actually. Which I suppose I should thank you for. I mean, if you hadn't tricked me into phoning my mom, I sure wouldn't be."

Emily grins in response,

"You've been speaking more? That's great. I'm really pleased, Paige."

"Yeah, she thinks you're some kind of saint, so…" Emily frowns,

"You told her about me?"

"Yeah. She wanted to know why I was suddenly so keen on speaking to her. It's no big deal, don't look at me like it means something, Emily." Paige is suddenly defensive, she told her mom about Emily and feels like she gave away something more than she should have. It was all before she found out about Dani, before the kiss, before it all got complicated. She looks at her watch, Holden'll be freaking, she reaches for her purse and stands up,

"I better go, Holden's gonna have my ass."

Emily hesitates a moment, then gets up,

"Do you mind if I walk back with you part way? I – I have to collect my car. I'm driving home now. Just had to see Dani."

Emily notices a shift in Paige's eyes, from the open gaze before, a shadow passes over them, and she wants to just reach out a hand and say to her, _it's ok, it's not what you think_, but she knows Paige won't listen to her at the moment, isn't ready to trust her again so soon.

"Oh. Well, I guess, why not? I've finished what I had to do."

They both reach down to take the bill up to the counter and as their hands connect, both jolt back, their eyes catch. And Paige sighs, thinks, _this is like some kind of fucking dance we do around one another isn't it? You spiral around me and I get caught up in you all over again._ Emily grabs the bill and steps up to the counter.

As they head back towards campus Emily asks,

"Are you going to the New Year thing?"

"Of course. You?"

"I didn't plan on it, though some of the girls were saying there's spare places in the cabin, so if I change my mind." She sighs and rolls her eyes, "or if my parents drive me crazy."

Paige smiles, says that'd be awesome if she came. Means anything but that. It'd be hell. She's looking forward to the vacation, three days up in the mountains with the swim team. Holden and Aria are going too, kind of as her guests. She remembers ruefully that she snowboarded last year and loved it – she wouldn't be able to this year, still not well enough, but she thought she'd just enjoy the company and the mountain air. She stops, they've reached the point where their journeys divert. Paige pauses before she heads off home, as Emily reaches into her bag. When she finds whatever it is she wanted, Paige can see she's nervous, blushing, she pushes back the piece of hair that's fallen in front of her eyes and looks shyly at Paige, holding out a cd case in her hand,

"I made you this," When Paige doesn't answer, she stammers out, "for Christmas. I-It's nothing, nothing much. Just a mix I made for you, some stuff I thought you'd like."

Paige bites her bottom lip, takes the cd and looks at the cover – Emily's printed out one of the photos Holden took of her and Emily at the xx gig they went to and fashioned it into a cd cover. Paige is wearing a grey vest top, she's been dancing, strands of her hair are plastered to her face, she's yelling something at Holden, her mouth wide, her eyes crinkled at the corners. Her arm's around Emily's shoulders and Emily's looking at her, her face a huge smile, her own arm tight around Paige's waist. She feels her stomach ache,

"Thanks, I – I didn't know if I was going to see you. I didn't get you anything."

"It doesn't matter. I wasn't really expecting anything. I was just going to drop this off on my way home." She catches Paige's eye, "I pass by your house on my way."

They stand for a moment, awkwardly, both unsure what to say, Paige breaks the silence,

"I better go. Look, thanks for this." She shakes the cd in her hand. "Have a good Christmas." Something about saying this makes her well up, she wanted to be saying it differently, saying it so it meant something, not like _this_, like a friend. She wants to ask what the cd _means_, but it's the wrong time, it's all the wrong time. Instead she starts to go.

"Paige?" She turns and sees Emily has her phone out, "can I call you? Over Christmas? Would that be ok?"

Paige shrugs, says it'll be ok, they exchange home phone numbers and Paige snuggles into her scarf, burying her nose into the soft material as she heads off back to meet Holden.

**XXXXXX**

On Christmas morning Paige wakes up to a clear blue sky, the sidewalks and buildings look clean and gleaming bright. Her mind drifts to Emily. She's still not sure if she can be Emily's friend but she decides, this Christmas morning, that she'll try to make it work, if that's all they can be. Emily has a good effect on her, she makes her the best her she can be. It's not easy, she still gets a little sick when she thinks about Emily and Dani being together, secretly she wonders if they've slept together yet, how Dani really feels about Emily, about Emily's scarring. She's watched Emily try to hide her scarring when she thinks she's unobserved and Paige sometimes just wants to hold her hands, to stop her, wants to say, no, it's _you_ it's a part of _you_ and therefore, it's beautiful too. She wonders if Dani does that for her. Then she shakes her head, needs to stop torturing herself, needs to stop thinking about Emily like that. She takes a peek at her phone, tries to kid herself she's not checking for Emily's number. She groans and gets out of bed, remembers how Holden called it the night Emily first stayed over, _whipped, McCullers_. She dresses for a run, the drive yesterday has left her stiff and tired and it's the only way she knows to keep herself occupied.

**XXXXXXX**

It feels odd to Emily, being home. She hasn't been back since she started at College and didn't realise how much she was relishing the freedom of going through her day without having to run everything past her mum. She knows her parents were terrified and worried about her, but the last few months were exhausting. It's hard for her when her mom slips straight back into that role. She finds it even harder when her dad, who's usually so relaxed, is obviously anxious and worried about her too.

She wants to spend time with them, but is finding the constant questions and attention hard. She smiles wryly to herself as she's sitting in her bedroom, thinking how easy it is to slip back into her role of being a teenager. She thinks Paige would laugh and say something funny to shake her out of her funk. She has her phone in her hand and for a moment, she considers sending her a text. Then she remembers that Paige isn't even sure she wants to be friends anymore. And all Emily can think of is how much that hurts.

**XXXXXX**

After a couple of days of being at home, Emily is finding it harder and harder to not just jump into her car and make the 5 hour journey to visit Paige. She wants to speak to her, wants to see her. And for some reason it seems more _urgent_ than when Paige was sick and they were fighting. If she could articulate it, it's almost as if time is running out, as if an opportunity will be lost, only she's not sure what the opportunity is, or what it is that will be lost. She's also getting a little weary of her parents. Her mom's constant checking on how she is is starting to grate on her. It's the constant reminder of what she's lost. Whether she knows she's doing it or not, Pam seems to be always on at her about what her plans are, has she decided her major? What are her plans now she'll no longer be an Olympian? She sees her taking in her scarring when she thinks Emily's not looking. They're not things Emily feels ready to deal with yet.

It takes two days of building up to it. Two days of pacing round, thinking of what to say, how to ask. She even makes a crib-sheet, then scrunches it up and chucks it in the bin. Two days of thinking about Paige's possible responses. Finally, she just decides to do it. To hell with the consequences. She calls Paige, who, as she picks up the phone, sounds more confused than ever,

"Emily?" Emily smiles as she hears her, the faint husk to her voice made a little stronger by the damage to her throat from her sickness.

"Paige? How are you? I was thinking, wondering, would you mind if I came up to the mountains with you?" There's no response from the other end, it goes on so long Emily worries the connection's been lost and she has to look at her phone.

"Er, sure. I mean, it's up to you, you've been invited, you're part of the team." Emily's a little disappointed, she wanted Paige to sound a little more enthusiastic, to tell her it wouldn't be the same without her.

"Ok. Could I maybe come up to yours first and we could travel up together?" Emily closes her fist until she can feel her nails dig into her palm as she hears Paige sigh,

"Um, I guess." Emily can almost hear Paige's brain whirring, hears her sigh again and her tone change, "sure, you know what that'd be great. It'll be good to see you, Em."

Emily smiles widely at the response and the use of her nickname. The conversation gets easier, they discuss Christmas, parents, Emily tentatively makes fun of Paige about making her phone her mom. Finally, they make plans for Emily to come up to Paige's on the 30th and Paige gives her directions.

After the phone call, Paige slumps down onto her bed. After a couple of minutes, she gets up, grabs a jacket and runs downstairs, calling as she goes out,

"I'm off to Holden's. I'll be back in a bit!"

She's glad she forced Holden to fit the cycle rack onto the car for the journey home, at least she's got her bike here. She cycles over to Holden's praying he's in. She's relieved when she sees his car parked in the street outside. She runs up the steps and rings the bell. Holden answers and holds the door open for her so she can stack her bike up in the hallway of the apartment block. She gives him a grimace and follows him upstairs.

"So, what do I owe the pleasure, Paige, you only saw me yesterday?"

His parents are out visiting his sister and they're having tea in the living-room.

"I'm fucked, Holden."

He raises an eyebrow over the top of his cup,

"Ok. What have you done this time?"

"Ugh. Emily phoned just now." She sees him shuffle as she mentions her name, "I know, I know. She wants to come to the cabin –"

"Just tell her there's not enough room."

"I wish. One of the girls has told her there's spaces available."

"Paige."

"I know. Worse than that?" He smirks,

"It gets _worse_?"

"She's coming up on Tuesday, staying at mine, and then travelling up with us."

Holden starts laughing, Paige glares at him,

"Thanks, Holden. I really needed some support."

"What am I supposed to do? You're the one who got into this mess."

"Thanks. What could I do?" She waits a beat, "You will play nice won't you?"

"Paige, I like her. I like her a lot. I wish she wasn't messing you around, but I won't be an ass to her."

"Do you think she's messing me around?"

"Don't you?"

Paige shrugs, tries to articulate what she's feeling,

"I don't know. It's weird, I can kind of understand it. She lost people she was close to in the crash and I feel like there's a part of her that can't take that again. Sometimes when you're with her it's like she zones out and it seems like you can't get close to her. Then there are other times when it feels like," she shrugs again, "oh, I don't know, it's probably just how every pretty girl is, how they make you feel when they pay you attention." She drops her head, says softly, "but I don't think so. It feels real, when we really connect, it's like nothing I've ever felt before."

Holden reaches over and rubs Paige's arm,

"Paige, I think I know what you mean. I've seen you together. It's not like she is with Dani." Paige's head snaps up,

"What d'you mean?"

"She's not _there_ when she's with her." Paige scoffs,

"You only saw them together the once, _and_ you were there, _and _it was just before a meet. She was probably just distracted." Holden shakes his head,

"No. They didn't know I was there. Look, Paige, just, be careful, please. I don't want to see you hurt. Just be sure she's ready before you do or say something this time." Paige groans and rubs the back of her neck,

"I know. I don't know what came over me. I think –I'd just realised how I felt about her and it made sense for me to tell her then and there, as soon as I could. And then I got drunk and kissing her just felt like the right thing to do to _tell_ her, to _show_ her. 'Cause if I showed her then she'd know for sure."

He smiles,

"You sure as hell showed her." Paige looks at him warily,

"Holden, how much did you see?"

"Enough, Paige, enough. Let's just say, you didn't hold back." She puts her head in her hands again and groans.

**xxxxxxx**

Two days later and Emily's nerves only increase the closer she gets to New York and to Paige's house. She normally loves driving, she slips her ipod onto shuffle and sings along. The problem is this time, it's as if her ipod is playing roulette with her emotions. She really needs to clear out all the love songs, the lust songs, the hurting-so-bad and the guilt-laden-cheating songs as soon as she can. It gets so she ends up finding a talk radio station instead.

She finally pulls up to what she assumes is Paige's street, she pulls into a parking bay and reaches for her phone, taking a deep breath she dials her number,

"I'm here."

She looks up at the apartment block, the brownstone building with steps up to the front and railings up the side. The double door is red and imposing. When Paige opens one side of it, standing, framed, she looks tiny in comparison. Emily feels herself flush with pleasure when she sees her. It's immediately following by a wash of guilt: she's barely spoken to Dani since she's been home, every time she's phoned, Emily's made an excuse to cut the phone-call short, or not to talk to her at all. She's been treating her as if she's an inconvenience. Emily knows she's not being fair to Dani, knows she has to be more honest.

Paige smiles at her and runs down the steps. There's an awkward moment as neither knows whether they should hug or not, Paige backs off a little and Emily rests her hand on her arm. Paige picks up her bags, under protest, Emily grabs one off her, Paige laughs,

"Alright, chill Fields, I'm just helping. We live at the top, it's a long way up."

"Yeah, well. _You _haven't been well, so quit with the chivalry, McCullers."

Paige shoves her way ahead of her, and Emily's filled with relief that Paige isn't going to be quiet, or awkward and it seems is going to try and be friends.

She peers upwards as Paige starts up the stairs. The stairs curl round above her, she hangs onto the wooden banister to give her some leverage with her bag and she starts up. She pauses before the door where Paige has disappeared into, starting a little when Paige's head appears around, with a small smile on her face,

"Ready?"

Emily didn't realise she was nervous. She knows Paige's mom is likely to be friendly, but she's scared of meeting her dad. Paige gives her a small squeeze of her hand and leans forward to whisper,

"They're not gonna eat you. They're fine." Emily shivers a little at the contact.

As it was, she needn't have worried. Ann McCullers steps forward and gives Emily a hug and a kiss, welcoming her into their small, neat kitchen. Emily's surprised. Paige's mom is small, but she's wiry, strong-looking and has a glint of kindness in her warm, brown eyes – Emily recognises Paige's eyes in them. When she turns to Paige's dad, she can see where Paige gets her athleticism from. He's tall, muscular, she remembers Paige telling her he was a basketball player at College and still coaches part-time with the kids on weekends. He's more reserved, less immediate than his wife, but his smile is welcoming and he holds out a big hand and shakes hers warmly.

The apartment is small and filled with pictures and books. Ann McCullers teaches art in a nearby public school part-time and is a potter with her own studio around the corner from her work. She recognises in it the making of Paige's little yellow-roomed house in College and she instantly feels more relaxed. There are papers littered on the floor just like there and she wonders how many of her own parents' habits she's taken with her. She realises, with what she's curious to see is a stab of jealousy, that Holden must have spent many days and hours here. Emily wanders over to look at the pots and Ann spends a little time talking to her about each one. Eventually, she offers to show Emily round her studio 'some other time'.

Dinner is quieter than meals at Paige and Holden's house and Emily is intrigued to witness the interaction between Paige and her parents. She's still wary with her dad, but Emily's aware that he's trying hard. He's polite to Emily, asking her questions about her studies and what she's majoring in. When he moves on to her swimming times, Emily feels Paige sigh loudly, about to step in, but she answers them, professing she doesn't mind. Ann is different. She's quick-witted, clever, steers the discussion round to current affairs, politics, things she's surprised to see Paige is comfortable talking about. She gives her an indulgent smile and thinks, another surprising thing she didn't know about her, and figures she could spend a lifetime getting to know Paige, and it wouldn't be enough.

After dinner, they watch a little sports on tv, until Paige's mom pointedly switches it off. They spend the rest of the evening reading punctuated with a little talking. Emily's not used to it, she's had two glasses of wine at dinner and it's made her a little woozy. She uses the time to dream. She watches Paige when she can, observing her reading, the little shakes of her head and scoffs she makes when she disagrees with something, or a little chuckle of recognition. Every now and again, she raises her eyes from the paper and catches Emily watching her, after the fourth or fifth time, she raises an eyebrow and winks.

The apartment's only two bedrooms, and Paige's room is small. They've managed to engineer in a camp-bed next to Paige's queen-sized one which is shoved unceremoniously back to the wall. It means she has to climb over the camp-bed to get to her own bed. Emily takes it in. It's a mess. She's never seen her room in College so she can't compare. There are clothes and books on the floor, a couple of cups and glasses line up on the window-sill. On the walls are posters of movies, pictures of actresses or pop stars torn from magazines alongside hand-written lines of poems and books. Paige notices her looking and chuckles,

"Every time I come in here, I'm _amazed_ my parents were surprised when I came out."

Emily looks again,

"There sure are a lot of pictures of girls here."

"I know, right. I haven't changed this since I was about 16, 17 I guess. I kind of like it. It's like a moment in time that I can step back into. Whenever I come back here I can look at the photos, or read the poems and I remember what I was like, why I liked a particular poem, what it meant to me, you know? It's like a time-capsule of me."

It's still early and they've come to the room to escape Paige's parents. Emily sits cross-legged on Paige's bed, leaning against the wall. Paige sits up the other end, propped up on the pillows. Her feet are near Emily's knees. Over the course of the next couple of hours, they seem to gravitate closer and closer to one another. They've talked over Christmas, presents, who on the team is going to the cabin and who they're bringing. Emily notices Paige is looking more tired and she remembers with a pang how ill she was, how the girls described her when they visited or spoke to her and she hangs her head, feels guilty.

"I'm so sorry, Paige."

"What for?"

"I should have visited. When you were ill." She adds, seeing Paige's puzzled look.

"Yeah. You should have. Look, I know what I did at the party was out of line. But I didn't know about you and Dani. Holden hadn't told me. Neither did you. How was I supposed to know? But, I don't think it was _so_ awful that you would ignore me." She looks really upset, "I was _really sick_, Emily."

Emily reaches out and holds Paige's hand. She runs her thumb over the back of her fingers.

"I know." Paige sighs at the way her stomach flips at the slight touch, tries to change the subject to surer ground,

"So, what's up with your parents?"

"I don't know. I'm just being stupid I guess. My mom doesn't seem to know how to talk to me anymore. It's like when I first came out, she didn't know how to handle that then, and she can't seem to handle this now."

"Why?"

"Because I'm _damaged_, Paige. I can see it when she looks at me. Goddamit, I can see it when everyone looks at me. How disgusted they are when they see me, my scars. And who can blame them when I look like _this?_"

Emily drops Paige's hand and grabs the bottom of her shirt, pulling it up to show her scars. Part of her is terrified, she's never shown them to anyone before, not on purpose, but she wants to see Paige's reaction. She has to know if Paige really doesn't care about them, or if she's just pretending. She watches, shaking as Paige cocks her head to look at her. She reaches out her hand and gently, so gently it makes Emily shiver, runs the tips of her fingers over the largest scar on her body: the one that runs from under her left breast over her ribs in a diagonal to just above her right hip. Then she presses the flat of her hand over the scarring above Emily's ribs. Her hand is cool and dry, sure, steady. She raises her eyes to meet Emily's and Emily lets out a shaky breath, wipes her eyes with the back of her hand. Paige smiles, removes her hand, thinks, _there is nothing more beautiful in this world_, says,

"Look, it's late. We should just. I don't know. Go to sleep or something. I'm tired, I'm still pretty exhausted."

Emily nods in agreement, there are so many things she has to say to Paige, so many reasons for the things she does and the choices she's made that aren't quite clear to her. But she knows that soon, she has to make some decisions, has to sort through those reasons. Paige goes to get up off the bed, to make up the camp bed, but as she moves, Emily pulls her down onto the bed next to her. Curling one arm around her stomach and the other around her shoulder, she bunches Paige's shirt into her hand and rests her head into Paige's neck. Paige doesn't struggle but Emily can feel her breathing quicken, feels her heart pounding.

"Emily, what are you doing?" Emily closes her eyes,

"Shh. Just. I don't know. Just, shut up, please."

And in a whisper, she talks to Paige about the night of the crash, about Ellie, about Dani and what's happened with them, that she's promised to give them time over the vacation. And she tells her how she feels about Paige. How she makes her feel safe, but scared at the same time. How much she missed her. How she feels herself only when she's with Paige and how everywhere else confuses her. How she can't bear to look at herself and her scars but how Paige is the only person who looks at them and touches them without fear or repulsion. How scared she is by the future. By who she is and who she will be. How she thought for so long that Ellie was her future. But how glad she is to have found Paige and someone who makes her future seem possible again. How she's given her hope again, made her want to be brave and to live in this crazy, stupid, magic world. She talks until she can't anymore, until all the words run out. And then she falls into a deep, deep sleep. A sleep that she hasn't slept since the accident, since before the accident, since before high school.

And Paige listens above the pounding in her chest and the spinning in her head. She listens and she understands that she just has to listen and wait. When Emily sleeps, she listens to her even breathing, until she too falls headlong into sleep; the door open, the light still on, until her mom pokes her head around the door and slipping quietly into the room, watches her little girl sleeping in the arms of the girl she loves. She switches off the light and gently shuts the door.

**XXXXX**

Somehow in the morning, Paige knows not to talk about what happened the night before. She's aware of how things that seemed so simple and so sure in the dark seem so complicated and frightening in the clear light of day.

They have to be up early to be ready for Holden to make the trip. Paige wants them to wait downstairs, she knows how Holden gets when he has to wait. Emily's said goodbye to Paige's parents and is on her way downstairs. Paige steps back into the kitchen to see her mom, after giving her a hug, Ann squeezes her arm,

"She's lovely, Paige, you're very lucky."

Paige flushes, stutters out,

"Oh, no, mom, we – we're not _together_."

"Are you sure? You looked pretty together last night."

"What? Did you come in my room last night? What did you _see_?"

"Paige. Didn't you notice your light was off this morning?" Ann chuckles seeing her usually so together daughter so flustered, "And I didn't _see_ anything." She looks at Paige, puzzled, "And, what do you mean you're not together?"

Paige looks at the floor, mumbles,

"What I said. We're not together."

Ann McCullers shrugs,

"Well, then, something's going wrong with the universe. Why not?"

"_Mo-om_."

"But you like her?" Paige keeps her eyes averted, but nods, "and she likes you?"

"It's complicated, mom."

"Really?" Ann's genuinely surprised, "But, she's all you talk to me about. And to be honest, the way you act around one another. Well. I was actually going to thank you for not sleeping together when you were here, for abstaining, give your father time to get over himself. Because he's trying really hard."

Paige's brain turns off. She stands open mouthed as her mother laughs at her.

"Listen, Paige. I wouldn't normally say this, but I think you're made for one another and the sooner you stop messing around the easier it'll be for all of you."

Paige still can't comprehend that she's talking to her mother about this. She turns and heads out the door, hearing her mother's laughter ring out behind her,

"Have a lovely time, dear."

When she gets down to the street where Emily is waiting Paige is still reeling. Emily takes a look at her,

"What's wrong with _you_?"

"Er, nothing, I'm ok. My mom sends you her love, I think."

Emily stares at her expecting a better response, until Paige is saved by the sight of Holden's car coming down the street.

The drive takes about 5 and a half hours and Paige takes over after 3. When they arrive at the camp at the foothills of the Adirondacks it doesn't take long to locate their cabin. Emily's impressed, the cabins are surrounded by woods with what looks like walking trails heading off in all directions. They're also only a few feet away from a lake with most of the cabins having a veranda looking out over it.

She can hear the noise coming from their cabin, it sounds like the party is already started. She's a little nervous having more or less invited herself here, and she's glad Paige is with her, even though she's still not sure what kind of footing they're on at the moment. She feels like they got back to 'friends' last night, though she's also sure that she blurred that line a little. She's grateful Paige hasn't mentioned anything about it, but she knows they need to talk. She follows the other three into the cabin and arrives in time to hear various whistles and cheers as Paige appears. She also can't help but notice Lauren flush as she sees Paige and hears very distinctly a call of "Hey, Lauren, looks like your booty call's arrived!" Paige laughs and Emily feels her stomach heave a little. She notices Paige pull Lauren away from the crowds as they have what looks like an intimate conversation. She looks away when Paige catches her eye.

As the night wears on she notices Paige seems to have been claimed by Lauren and Dana Narcizo and their little gang, Paige makes a move to include her, but Emily's having a hard time with the way Lauren is behaving with Paige. Emily remembers the insinuations and the rumours of what happened between them at the party after she left. Emily watches Lauren, she's using every excuse she can to touch Paige, an arm around a shoulder while showing her something, little touches to her elbow to point something out, a brush of hands when sitting next to one another. And Emily notices with a pang that Paige isn't stopping her. When a couple of the other girls suggest going out for a walk, Emily decides to go with them, when she turns to ask if Paige wants to go, she's met with a smile but a shake of the head that goes right through her.

As the night wears on, Emily's feelings of uncertainty grow. She's watching Paige, who seems to be at the heart of the party. She watches her as she talks to Holden and Aria, how she laughs easily at Holden's conversation, a hand on his arm as she leans in to talk to him, a wicked smile on her face and her heart aches as she realizes how much she wants to be the one Paige is laughing with, the one she talks to, the one who her eyes follow as she moves around the room. Emily's beginning to recognize things for what they are and she knows she's falling for Paige, but she's terrified: she's terrified of starting anything with her – of beginning a life only to potentially lose it; and she's terrified of having missed her chance. As midnight approaches, Emily can feel a blankness descend on her. She can feel her heartbeat increasing, feels the blood pounding in her ears and is aware of how close she is to losing herself again. She knows she has to break out of it, she doesn't want it, but she's unsure how to get out of the funk without Paige nearby. Before, when Emily got into this state, she noticed that Paige will stand close, close enough for her to feel her there, feel her strength and familiar warmth and it pulls her back to the now again. These episodes have been happening less and less and she thought she was over them but this one is real enough and she's scared. Her breathing gets faster, she can feel her face flush and the room starts to spin a little. Her chest is constricting. She moves to where she can see there's a chair and she grabs the back of it. As she fears she's about to lose it, she feels a cool hand on her forearm,

"Em? Ok?"

She swallows, chokes down a cry and feels her heart-rate diminish until she's more or less breathing normally. Paige is standing in front of her, warm brown eyes laced with concern, but she's not making a fuss. She quietly sits Emily down and squats in front of her until she's at her eye-level.

"It's ok. You're fine. I thought you weren't getting these anymore?"

"So did I."

"Is it all the people? It's kinda hot in here. I was sitting out on the veranda for a while earlier. It's cold but it's lovely. You want to go out there now?"

Emily nods and Paige quietly finds Emily's coat and her own and leads them out the back. She sits on a bench and Emily sits next to her, almost surprised when Paige doesn't shuffle away. They sit still for a while, watching over the lake, hearing the snap and pop of the lake and the woods around them and the shrieks and cries and laughter coming from within the house.

After they've been sitting out about quarter of an hour, Paige notices Emily shiver. When she was out earlier she brought with her one of the fur throws from the bedroom. She grabs it from where she left it on the floor and puts one end round her shoulder, tucking the other around Emily. Emily shuffles a little closer. She reaches down underneath the throw that's wrapped around them until she finds Paige's hand. She loops their fingers together, whispers,

"Please. Don't say anything. Just let me."

Paige nods, afraid to say anything as her breath hitches. She closes her eyes, thinks, _please, just love me or just leave me alone_. But she's too scared to say it. Just sits and waits. They can hear the noises from inside change, becoming more excitable and Paige suddenly remembers the time, the significance of the day. She checks her watch – it's a couple of minutes to midnight. She squeezes Emily's hand,

"Hey. You ok? You want to go back in? It's nearly midnight."

Emily pulls away from Paige, suddenly pulled out of her reverie. She swallows,

"N-no. I'm ok." She waits a beat, "you can go back in though. If you want."

Paige laughs quietly,

"You can't see in the New Year on your own."

"Don't you want to go inside? With your friends?" With Lauren she means, but she can't bring herself to ask it. Doesn't want to know the answer.

"Nah. I'm ok. They don't need me."

And Emily thinks, _no, but I do_.

They can hear the countdown starting. Paige shuffles uncomfortably, until she hears the shouts and guesses midnight has come, and it seems the most natural thing in the world to lean forward, as Emily leans in at the same time. Her kiss finds the corner of Emily's mouth. Emily slides her lips across her cheek, softly, ghostly, as Paige whispers,

"_Emily_."

And they hold one another close. Paige pulling away first.

"Happy New Year, Em."

"Happy New Year, Paige."

Emily waits a beat, unsure if she should ask what she wants, but she's emboldened by the new year and a new start. She needs to understand where things stand so she can maybe start to sort out what she wants, what Paige wants, what she needs to do to be where they can, perhaps, be together. Because, as the clock struck twelve, she finally admits that Paige _is_ what she wants and she thinks back to what Paige told her once, that she survived, more than that, she fought to live so perhaps she should start to do just that. She's very aware of Paige, can feel every breath, her skin beneath her heavy winter coat prickles with desire, as they're staring out in the cold moonlight. Emily shuffles a little closer to Paige and is relieved to feel her relax against her rather than move away. She finds her hand again and is rewarded with the feeling of the rough edge of Paige's thumb moving slowly across the back of her hand.

"Paige?"

Paige is half unable to breathe, every breath hitches in her throat at Emily's touch and now she's caught hold of her hand again it's getting harder not to believe - in 'us' in 'we', those things she wants to say when she's with Emily, or when she's talking about her. She makes a small movement to let Emily know she's listening, unable to trust her voice.

"Can I ask you something?"

Paige sighs, clears her throat, unsure, cowardly,

"What?"

"Are you and Lauren? Did you? Um,"

"Sleep together? Are we together?" Paige laughs and shakes her head, "I can't believe you're asking me this when I'm here with you. Do you really think if we were that I'd be here?"

"Sorry. I know. I just. When all the girls tease you about it, you just handle it all so coolly. And I just really need to know."

"Em."

Emily's right, of course. But the reason is not what she thinks, when Paige arrived at the cabin and everyone wolf-whistled and made comments about her and Lauren being together, Paige didn't not deny it for herself, but for Lauren. She headed over to where Lauren was, smiled and touched her arm to drag off to a quieter corner of the room. Lauren couldn't look at her, hung her head a little as Paige asked,

"You haven't told them?"

Lauren looked back at her with a pained expression,

"I couldn't, I'm sorry."

'Lauren, look. I haven't denied anything 'cause I don't want to put you down in front of everyone and I don't want to hurt you. But, please, you have to let them know there's nothing between us." She looked intently at Lauren, begging for her to understand, and for the message to get through, "because there _is_ nothing between us. You're my friend, Lauren, don't let's lose that, please."

But it's hard to tell that to Emily, because it's like an admittance that she's waiting for her. And then her resolution kicks in, fuck it, she's going to be brave, she's going to admit what she wants and then she and Emily and the whole fucking universe can just deal with the consequences. She takes a breath, says with all the sincerity she can,

"You know, I'm fed up with this. I'm fed up with pussy-footing around this, around us, Em. No. Lauren and I aren't together. We did sleep together a couple of times in sophomore and freshman years. I know she liked me, likes me still, maybe, but, it's not right. I don't feel like that about her. She just needs a bit of confidence and I'm not gonna shoot her down in front of her friends." She shrugs, "I can't do that." She takes a deep breath, lets it go, "Plus, I'm pretty sure you know how I feel about you."

She hears Emily swallow and the grip on her hand tighten, but all she says is,

"Ok."

"What about you?"

"What?"

"You and Dani?"

Emily recoils back a little, looks at Paige and blushes, thankful for the darkness. Finally, she says,

"No."

"Really?"

Paige watches as Emily's eyes slide from hers and look out away across the dark. She hears her take a deep breath and leans in to listen,

"No. We haven't. I _can't_. I don't _feel_ it with Dani."

Paige isn't expecting this. Doesn't quite know how to respond, so says nothing.

"I thought it was something to do with the accident, losing Ellie, you know, that it was just the way it was from now on. And then, you kissed me, at the party." She sighs, "And you're right, I _did_ kiss you back, because I was drunk, but mainly 'cause I like you, and partly because I was curious. And…" she laughs, an embarrassed laugh and rubs her eyes with her free hand, Paige can feel her heart beating, her palm where she's holding Emily's hand start to sweat.

"And?"

Emily looks away, she's embarrassed as hell,

"_You know_."

"_Oh_."

Paige swallows, hard. She drops Emily's hand and stands up, not quite knowing what to do, murmuring,

"Jesus."

"Paige? What do we do now?"

"Fuck. Um. First you need to give me a minute."

Emily laughs, underneath her own embarrassment, she loves seeing Paige as flustered as she is. She watches her as Paige leans on the veranda railings, then turns back to her and shakes her head. She watches as a grin spreads on Paige's face,

"So. You _like_ me?"

Emily's relieved, at last she can say it, mean it.

"Yes."

"_Like_ me, like me? Want to _be_ with me like me?"

Emily laughs, says more surely,

"Yes."

They wait a beat, then another, just staring at one another,

"What about Dani, Emily? What are you gonna do? 'Cause I'm not going to screw her around and I don't think it's you to do that either."

Emily shakes her head,

"No. I won't. I'll tell her. I owe her that."

Paige has turned and is standing, hands on the railings behind her, she rocks back and forth on her heels as she listens. Her heart's going like mad, like she's done a sprint finish in the relay and she has a rush of adrenaline coursing through her. She nods, breathes out,

"So. What do we do now?"

"Give me some time?" She raises her head from where she's been looking at the floor, whispers, "I'm just scared. I'm terrified. Do you understand?"

"Sure." Paige reaches out and just puts her arms around her. Feels Emily relax into her. She stands and holds her, kisses her temple above her left ear. "Sure. Just don't make me wait _too_ long, huh?"


	7. Chapter 7

**Thanks again for the reviews, it's so nice to hear you're still enjoying the story. Ok. Here's the pay-off - hope I've done them justice. **

Paige can't quite understand how everyone doesn't see how she's different. As if she has nerve-endings instead of skin, she feels open, exposed. It becomes worse when Emily's around because she gravitates towards her as if there is a line that connects them together. Nothing more has been said, between them, or to anyone else. Paige hasn't even talked to Holden, she feels like even if she were to _try_ and explain it, there aren't the words to articulate it. So she's walking around as if she's being spied on, on edge, waiting.

They try not to spend any time alone together. Emily professes to herself that she doesn't want to hurt Dani; that she's still raw herself and still scared that anything more between them will send her hurtling to the bright light that still hovers within her. So they sit with some of the others at breakfast; meet at Paige's house when they know Holden and Aria will be home; go to the White Dog at the busiest times. They never go to Emily's.

They sit close in these spaces. Nerves crackling so the brush of an arm is an agony. Paige can't take much more. It's been three weeks since New Years' eve. She doesn't have the willpower. She explodes at Holden when he makes a lame-ass joke about Emily coming over and then sits down and cries. Holden squats in front of her,

"Ok, what's going on?"

"Nothing."

"Yeah. I'm not buying that anymore, Paige." She tries to smile,

"No, I mean, the problem is, there's _nothing_ going on." Holden waits,

"Ah. Ok. With….?" He waits a beat as she says nothing, says unsurely, "Are we talking about you and Emily? Because, you may not have told me anything, but I'm sure as hell _some_thing happened between you at New Year."

Paige snuffles, wipes her eyes and her nose on her sleeve. She shuffles up the sofa as Holden sits next to her and puts his arm round her.

"See? That's the problem, I don't know. Nothing _happened_, but we talked and, and I feel like something 's changed but.." She shrugs. "I'm so fucking confused, Holden."

"Ok. So, what was said?"

"I know she likes me. She told me she likes me. She admitted to kissing me back at the party. But she says she wants time."

"How much time does she need, Paige?" She shrugs again, looks pained,

"I don't know. She's still so _damaged_ Holden."

"But you think you can handle it?"

"I think so."

"Then, perhaps you don't wait for her." She stares at him,

"What d'you mean?"

"I don't think it's fair that all the power lies with her. I think you need to take some control. What's she waiting for? Until she suddenly feels better? _Less_ damaged? What if you _being_ together is the final thing that heals her?"

"What if it's the final thing that damages her for good?" And she sounds so pathetic and sad that Holden laughs and kisses her hair, pulling her in for a hug.

"Then at least you know."

She sits and thinks about what he's said for a few days. She knows he's right. She can't go on like this anymore. Every practice with Emily is an agony. Every raise of Emily's eyebrow as she's changing; every smile that she gives her when she walks into a room is like someone's carving her name into her skin. She makes a decision.

It's cold still. It's afternoon, she's had no lectures so she and Aria are at the house together waiting for Holden to come home. They're supposed to be watching a film but Paige can't concentrate, she's up and down, fetching something to eat, then something to drink, then she needs to get her phone. Finally Aria huffs, turns off the film and stares at Paige,

"Ok. You're not concentrating and you're pissing me off. Just go and do what you have to do, wherever it is and leave me to watch this in peace."

Paige mumbles something about not having anything to do and apologises. Aria sighs and turns fully towards her,

"Go see her, Paige."

Paige taps her foot on the floor, a sure sign she's unsettled and bites the side of her thumb. Eventually she sighs out,

"You're right, you're right. I'm gonna go see her."

She jumps up, throws on a hoodie and in a whirl of anxiety and hope, she kisses Aria's cheek and heads out the door,

"Ok. Ok." Takes a deep breath, "wish me luck." Aria looks back at her,

"I really, really do."

Paige cycles faster to campus than she ever has before. She knows where Emily should be - just finishing a lecture. As she pulls up in the quad she spots Emily and her stomach flips. She catches sight of Spencer waving to Emily and calling her over and she feels sick. She thinks about turning to leave, but she can't. She has to know, and Spencer can just get over herself. And, somewhere in the back of her head she thinks that maybe, if Spencer hears then she'll let her be and stop bugging Emily about Dani and about her and Emily. She rests her bike by the stands, takes a deep breath and wipes her hands on the side of her jeans. She walks up to Emily, noticing with satisfaction the grin that appears on her face as she spots her.

"Paige!"

"Hi, Em." She nods at Spencer, "Spencer." Spencer glares back at her, voice dripping with sarcasm,

"Paige, what a delightful surprise. Look, we're going somewhere so if you could –" Paige steps forward to block her,

"No! Er, I mean, no, I can't. Emily I have to talk to you." And all of a sudden all the fancy words she's been rehearsing on the way here fall away, and she thinks, _I'm just a girl, what the hell have I got to offer someone like you?_ Then she remembers New Year's eve and the night before New Year in her bed, when Emily held her and the things she told her. And she takes a deep breath,

"Em, do you remember when I said I didn't think I could just be friends with you?" Emily looks awkwardly at Spencer, then back to Paige, nods.

"Well. I think I was right. I don't think I can be."

She hears Spencer scoff beside her, begin to say something, but Paige isn't going to be knocked from her course now,

"I don't think I can be, because we could have something _really good_." She sees Emily's face shut down, she closes her eyes, and on another day, Paige would have believed that it was over there and then. This time, this day, she knows it isn't. She just needs to find the right words. "Em. You believe you're not ready, but what if you are? What if you just need me, us, to make you ready? Remember what Coach says? The body doesn't lie. Listen to it, Em. You told me something at New Year that I think answers the question for you. Don't ruin this by cowardice. You have to _live_, Em. Remember you chose to live. Be brave. Be bold." She waits a beat, "And _trust_ me. Like you did with swimming. Just trust me because," she takes a deep breath, "I'm pretty sure I'm in love with you."

She stops, stands and watches as Emily's eyes fill and she swallows. Paige doesn't want this, not here, not now. Doesn't want to make Emily cry. Never wants that for her. She's said what she needs to. She brushes a piece of hair back behind Emily's ear and gently touches the side of her face.

"Ok, I'm gonna go. But now you know. Only, I can't wait forever, Em. I can't, I have to get on with or without you. And I need to know if it's one or the other. But you need to either take a chance on us, or leave me the hell alone. Because I can't do this anymore. "

She looks at Spencer and smiles, shrugs,

"Sorry, you can go for your coffee or whatever now. Thanks."

She doesn't look back. To them, it looks like arrogance. To Paige, it's all she can do to not turn round and apologise. To tell Emily to take all the time she needs, whether it's next week or next year, hell whether it's ten years time. But at the same time, she feels calm, confident, controlled. And it feels good. She heads back home.

Aria's sitting in the same place, the only change a half-drunk cup of coffee on the floor next to her. She looks up expectantly as Paige comes through the door. Paige smiles and shrugs.

"Ok? How'd it go? What happened?"

"I saw her."

"Good."

"Yeah. Spencer was there."

"Ok, bad."

Paige laughs, and sits next to Aria,

"Kind of. It threw me off at first, but I said what I wanted to say. Well," she pauses, "I forgot completely what I wanted to say, but I said something."

"Good." Aria rubs Paige's back, "That's gotta be good, right? 'Cause you can't go on like you were." Paige turns to look at her,

"Yeah, sorry about that. Have I been a complete pain?"

"Only since Christmas. A bit."

The sit in silence for a while. Aria's just about to get up when Paige starts talking again.

"I'm glad I said something though. It feels good. I feel like I can move on." She dips her head and then looks back at Aria, "I feel like I can get on and stop being a pain in the ass. Oh – until I realize I've been completely rejected. Who _knows_ what'll happen then." She smiles a rueful smile, "I'm really sorry."

"Doesn't matter. And if you are rejected? Then we'll deal. You're not on your own, Paige."

"Thanks. I know."

**XXXXX**

Emily's left standing, staring at Paige's retreating back. She hears Spencer huff beside her, knows she's going to get a tirade of anti-Paige propaganda and she pulls herself together, puts a lid on the butterfly flutter in her stomach. Waits.

"Huh. Like you can believe a word of _that_. You know, I really don't get how you can still be friends with her. After the way she treated Dani, the way she just thinks she can treat _every_one. You know what she was like in freshman year, how she just slept her way through most of the campus –"

"Yeah, I know what _you_'ve told me, Spence."

"What the hell is _that_ supposed to mean?" Emily shakes her head,

"It means what I said. And anyway, people change. I don't think she's like that. Not anymore, I've seen no evidence."

"Then perhaps you need to open your eyes when it comes to her, Emily. She's still messing that Lauren around, from the swim team."

"Yeah? And where did you hear that?"

"Dani." It's Emily's turn to scoff. Spencer flashes into anger, "No, you don't get to do that. You know, the Emily I know would _never_ treat someone like you treated Dani."

"Spence. I know I treated Dani badly –"

"Well, at least you admit it. And all because of _her_." Emily states, more loudly this time,

"_I_ treated Dani badly. But it was _me_. Nothing to do with Paige."

"Sometimes I don't think I know who you are anymore, Emily. You're different."

"Don't you think what happened to me might make me a little different, Spence? We knew one another in _high _school and I'd changed before the accident. I _died twice_. Do you really think I'm gonna be the same person you knew before? You can't keep me as your scared and shy friend who needs protecting. Paige doesn't see me that way, she challenges me, sometimes she scares me, but you – and Dani – you make me walk around like there's glass between me and the world. Paige doesn't. Paige wants me to live in the real world, live in it _with_ her."

Emily knows Spencer. She knows that for her, at this moment, it's all about winning her argument, but she also knows that once she has time, she'll think about what Emily's saying and that she isn't too arrogant to change her mind. At this moment, she knows she's going to have to endure whatever it is that Spence wants to throw at her. She braces herself,

"God. I can't believe you're being so naïve. Emily, she just wants to get you into bed – another score on her card."

Emily's stomach unexpectedly flips, and Spencer can't help but notice the shy smile that spreads on Emily's face. She knows at that moment that she's lost. Emily says more quietly,

"And maybe that's where I want to be."

"Well then, I can't help you."

"Spence, I'm not asking you to. But I would like your support. And I would like your friendship. And I would like you to try with Paige. Because, I think I'm in love with her."

Spencer rolls her eyes. But she loves Emily. She shrugs,

"So, what do I do?"

"Spence, I don't want you to do anything. I just want you to be my friend."

"Then I am. But don't expect me not to try and protect you, 'cause that's what I do."

"I know. And it's why I love you. Thank you." She loops her arm through Spencer's, "Come on, let's go get that coffee."

**XXXXX**

Emily keeps it to herself for two days, like a secret, or a promise, or a present that she visualizes unwrapping, expectation growing. For two days, she acts, at least on the outside, as if all is the same: at swim practice, in lectures, even just in the quiet of her own room. She knows Paige is waiting for her to say something and she's teasing her. And she has to admit, she's enjoying it. She's also terrified. This thing that's grown between them, she knows it could blow her apart. But she also knows that Paige is the chance she has to take to move on, to build a future – because that's what Paige offers her.

Day three, Friday, she's sitting in the White Dog café. If anyone were watching her, they'd be aware that she's waiting for someone, every time the door opens her head snaps up, every few minutes she checks her phone, sighs and drops it into her pocket again. Eventually, the door opens and she smiles as Holden comes through the door. He waves,

"Hi. You ok?"

"Yeah. Thanks for coming. Do you want anything?"

"I'll just get a coffee." He motions to Elaine, the waitress, who brings his order. He settles back into his chair and takes a sip. "So? What's with the secrecy?"

Emily blushes a little, she has a favour to ask but is a little worried she may have to win him over before he agrees. She's banking on his relationship with Paige to help her. She takes a breath,

"Holden. I want to ask you something."

**XXXXX**

Later that day, Paige is sitting in the living room with a hopeful look on her face. When she sees how Holden and Aria are dressed, she looks positively miserable.

"What's going on? You going out?"

If she wasn't so caught up in herself, Paige would have noticed Holden and Aria's somewhat shifty looks at one another, she stands, Holden replies,

"Yeah."

"You didn't say. Oh come on, you gonna leave me here? All by myself on a Friday night?"

"Yeah, we've had this planned for ages, me and Aria time. I mentioned it a while ago, but you've been, you know, preoccupied."

"Oh. Well. I guess." She gestures towards the tv, where she's streaming a zombie movie marathon, "I got this ready. But …." She shrugs, "I'll watch them by myself."

Aria laughs and pulls her into a hug,

"Stop being so dramatic, Paige. Just, have a nice night."

"Yeah. Right." They head out the door, Paige calling after them, "Hey! I don't even have anything to eat." The door shuts and Paige throws herself onto the couch, "Yeah. I'll just get a take-out."

About an hour later, Paige is still lying on the couch. She's playing a film, but not really watching when she hears the wind-chimes by the door as if someone's knocked into them and snaps upright. There's a tentative knock on the door and she steps up to open it.

"Emily!"

"Hi." Emily's standing in front of her, holds a bag of Chinese take-out up. She looks shy, scared. Paige swallows and holds onto the door as she feels her stomach dip and for a moment, she just wants to slam the door shut. She manages to stutter out a hello and opens the door wider.

"Hi. What are you doing here?"

"What you said. To come over. To see you." Emily stands, uncomfortable in the middle of the room, "I brought take-out."

"Yeah. So I see."

Paige takes the take-out from Emily and heads to the kitchen. She noticed her hands shaking when she took the bag and she puts it down, leaning on the work-top. She didn't realize Emily had followed her and she jumps when she hears her ask,

"Paige? You ok?"

Paige closes her eyes and turns round. Knows she sounds rude, but can't help it.

"Why are you here, Emily? Why do I do this to myself with you? I open myself up to you and I don't hear anything for _three days_. It's like when I was sick all over again. What are you doing here?"

Emily steps closer. So close she can see the faint lines around Paige's eyes, the dark circles. She reaches up a hand and touches her cheek gently, faintly. Paige closes her eyes, leans into her hand.

"You were right." Emily's voice is hoarse.

"When?"

"I _do_ want you, want to be with you. I'm sorry I didn't admit it for so long. I'm sorry I messed up with Dani. But mainly I'm sorry I hurt you. Made you think I don't want you. Because I do. I_ do_ want you." Her voice becomes a whisper, "So much" As her lips gently move to replace her hand and she kisses down Paige's cheek to the corner of her mouth. She pulls back to look at Paige.

Paige's breathing is shallow as she leans forward and kisses Emily: tongues sliding together, Paige tastes Emily, hands still bracing her against the worktop. Eventually, she moves them, slides a hand to Emily's neck, her face and up into her hair, the other around to the small of her back, pulling her towards her. She feels Emily moan into her mouth as they kiss and kiss. Emily pulls back, smiles and rests her forehead against Paige's,

"Wow."

"Ok?"

"Sure."

Paige moves closer again, places a kiss on her temple, moves her mouth down to her ear and takes the lobe between her teeth, gently, gently, placing a kiss, before moving along Emily's jawline back to her mouth where she kisses the corner of it. Paige feels Emily push against her with more urgency, Paige is aware of what Emily said at New Year: she doesn't want to push her too far, to scare her away, but she wants her so very much it's hard for her to stop. Emily turns her face slightly so Paige has nowhere left to go but back to Emily's mouth, where her lips part more than willingly for Paige's tongue. Paige can feel her heart pounding, her hands beginning to sweat where they've pulled Emily forward so she's flush against her body. She moves one hand to where her thumb can gently caress Emily's neck, finding and pausing a moment as she feels her pulse, drumming against her fingers, feels her swallow, feels the breath hitch in her throat as their mouths move against one another.

And Paige has this desire to feel, to just touch Emily's skin. Without breaking the kiss, she gently moves her hand from around Emily's waist until it hovers above the hem of her shirt, then gently, she slips her thumb under the material and smoothes the rough edge of her thumb over Emily's stomach and along. She feel Emily tense at the touch and Paige pauses a moment to check she's ok, Emily gives a slight nod and Paige continues, moves her hand until her palm is soft against the scar, the one she felt that night in her bed and she feels Emily shiver and moan, her hips push into her.

Emily pulls back, gathers her breath, "Paige? Could we just…" as Paige pushes against her, closer, kisses her lips, her cheek, moves to nuzzle at her neck, below her ear, along her throat. "Jesus, Paige." She carries on kissing her, Emily turns her head to bring their lips back together, murmurs against them. "Can we just go upstairs?"

The desperation in Emily's voice and the nerves in her stomach make Paige pause and she laughs, a low throaty laugh. She grabs Emily's hand and they make slow progress up the stairs, kissing, hands touching, exploring. By the time they reach the top of the stairs, Paige has lost her shirt and the top four buttons of Emily's top are open.

They pause and break apart only when Paige's door is open and they're in her room. Paige sees Emily swallow, sees her eyes pool over, senses her hesitation. She steps in and pushes Emily's hair away from her face.

"It's ok."

Emily's breathing is getting faster, more shallow, she's on the verge of panic, her eyes are sliding from Paige's gaze, she moves her hands to touch Emily's face,

"Shh, Em, it's ok."

"Is it? I'm terrified."

Paige nods.

"Paige, I hope to God that you love me."

"I do. I do love you. I think I knew you the moment I met you. Do you remember? Outside Coach Brennan's office?"

Emily smiles, remembers.

"I thought Holden was your boyfriend."

Paige laughs again, whispers, voice hoarse with emotion, lust,

"And loved you the first time I spoke to you."

Paige sees Emily's breathing returning to normal and though she's still breathing heavily, knows it's not from panic or fear. She moves towards her again, kisses her, running her tongue over Emily's bottom lip, she feels her mouth open against hers. "I love you." She tells her and knows that she'll tell her over and over again for as long as, and whenever she needs. "And I want you. I want you _so_ much." Paige steps closer, encloses her in her arms and hears Emily's voice close into her neck,

"Paige? What if I disappear?"

"I won't let you. I'm here now. I'm never letting you go anywhere. You're safe. Trust me."

Emily nods. Paige gently lifts Emily's dark-blue Henley over her head, sees her flinch as she reveals her stomach, breasts, shoulders. She sees the scarring running around Emily's right shoulder as she pushes her bra strap off and brings her lips, gently, to kiss the raise of skin there. She feels Emily tense as she pushes the strap off her other shoulder and reaches round to undo the clasp and lets the material fall. She quickly removes her jeans, her own bra; then lightly runs her fingers across Emily's neck, following the thick band of damaged tissue, down, ghosting over her breasts. Feeling Emily move to protest, she moves her hand to the scar over her ribs and leaves the palm of her hand resting there, flat against her stomach. She looks back at her face,

"Don't. Don't stop me. You are _so_ beautiful."

"I'm not. How can you say that?"

"How can I not?"

And for a moment, she wonders how Emily must have been before the accident. But this scarring that she hates so much, Paige loves. It's the proof of her desire to live - her chance for a future - the chance that brought her to Paige to look after her and love her. And so she loves it. She kisses her way down Emily's neck, along her collarbone to her scars, then back again down her breasts, gently sucking at her nipples. She feels how Emily responds to her, her skin prickling as she kisses it, nipples hardening, hears her breath hitching, feels her fingers raking down her back, pulling her closer. She pulls at Emily's jeans button until it opens as she pulls back to let Emily slide her jeans down her legs and pull them off. They move forward again, Paige waiting until Emily puts her arms around her and rocks into her, her hands ghosting over her back, shoulders, shoulder blades.

She moves them backwards until they can fall onto the bed where Paige braces herself on one arm above Emily. She leans forwards as Emily leans up and they kiss again, as Paige runs her hand along Emily's ribs, down around her hip. She feels Emily's hands against her back, her fingers grasping. She's kissing and sucking at her breasts, down over her scars. Emily moans and Paige moves back up to her mouth, licks along her lips, dipping her tongue inside to meet Emily's. Paige feels Emily's hands running along the sides of her body, up until she's cupping her breasts in her hands and thumbs her nipples. Paige feels her stomach dip, the wetness pool between her legs, her breathing hitch.

Her hand snakes down Emily's body until she's moving soft circles on the inside of her thighs. She's waiting, wants Emily to ask, doesn't want to do anything wrong, or push too far too soon. She feels Emily's legs open and feels her whisper into her mouth, 'Please, Paige.' 'Inside?" "Mmm." So she moves her hand, pushing upwards until she feels Emily, wet, she smiles into her mouth, and feels Emily smile and cry out a little as she slides one finger inside her. Both catch their breath as Paige rocks her hips to increase the pressure. Emily arches a little into her, digging her nails into her shoulder, her hip. Paige adds another finger and presses her thumb down, moving against her, increasing pressure and rhythm. She can feel Emily close, so close, feels her breathing quicken, then, unexpectedly, feels her holding back, pulling away, Paige leans forward, her mouth to her ear and whispers,

"It's ok. I'm here. I'm here. Let go. Trust me. You can always trust me."

And Emily feels it. Feels Paige all around her, inside her, next to her, above her and she lets go, far away from the fear that letting go will make her lose herself to the bright white light, because when she shudders and cries out she feels Paige with her, hears her voice and it tethers her to her.

They lie for a moment, panting, breath mingling, Paige kisses Emily again, softly. Moves her hands to where she can just hold her for a moment. She feels Emily begin to shake, pulls back to see tears, moves closer to kiss them away,

"Shh. It's ok. It's ok."

"Paige, it's like dying. It feels like dying. I can feel the light, its heat."

And for a moment, Paige feels awful, guilty. She never wanted this for her. Feels like she shouldn't have pressed her, but she wanted Emily so much. Still wants her, even after this, this desire for her hasn't gone. If anything, this glimpse has made her want her so much more. Paige dips her head, kisses her collarbone, holds on tight, until she hears Emily continue,

"But I could feel you with me. And I knew I'd come back." She starts to laugh, "It's beautiful. I forgot how.." she searches for the right word, smiles at Paige, looking so lost and scared, "You're beautiful."

And Emily waits for a moment, for a beat of her pounding heart as it slows. Emboldened she takes Paige by surprise as she flips them, so she's lying flush against Paige's body, aware of her own weight on her, of the bumps and wheals of her scars,

"Is this ok? Does it feel gross? Can you feel them?"

Paige smiles back at her,

"Don't, Em. You're beautiful."

She moves a hand to Paige's breast, kneading it, running her thumb over the nipple she watches Paige sigh. She runs her tongue down Paige's clavicle, between her breasts and dips into her belly-button, laughing as Paige squirms a little. Paige's hands fist in the covers and Emily sneaks a look at Paige before she shuffles down, settling between Paige's legs and Paige's breath hitches. As Emily's tongue sneaks out, Paige sighs her name. Her tongue sneaks out again and Paige's moans fill the room. She feels Paige tense and arch above her, a hand fist in her hair. She presses the flat of her tongue along Paige's clit and sliding two fingers inside, she feels Paige clench around her, she hums into her, licks and sucks, hearing Paige moan, until she's bucking and arching on the bed above her and she has to hold her legs tighter to hold her down. She kisses her letting her come down and moves upwards, kissing along her body, over her throat, her chin until she's at her lips, where they kiss, gently, deeply.

"God, I love you." Paige says, and again, as her heartbeat slows to normal, "I love you."

They snuggle together, limbs tangled, breath mingling, wrapped tightly together and drift off.

Waking a little later, Emily watches Paige as she studies her. She runs her hand across her body, thumb grazing over her skin, raising goosebumps. Tracing the scars, as she drags her hand across her, she follows with her lips and tongue. Emily feels herself spiral upwards again, her heartbeat increasing. But she needs to know something,

"Is it gross?"

"Mmm?" Paige isn't really listening. She's marveling, awe-struck, creating her own desire-lines around Emily's body. Emily tugs at her, bringing her back to her attention.

"Paige. Is it gross?"

"What?"

"The scars. Do you think, one day, you'll wake up and see them, as gross, disgusting?"

Paige shakes her head to clear it. Can't understand what the hell Emily is saying. She frowns,

"Never." She props herself on her elbow looking down on Emily, "Never. They're part of you. So they're beautiful."

It sounds so simple, so obvious when Paige says it, that Emily almost believes her. She leans towards her and they come together again, murmurs and whispers, little cries, nothing between them, breast to breast as tongues and hands move together.

It's just after eleven, when they're lying wrapped so closely it's hard to tell whose limb belongs to whom. Paige traces down Emily's arm. Down the scars, to where her vein wraps around her forearm and down to the back of her hand, the result of Emily's weight training and her belief in how it helps her swimming – a tip she's passed on to Coach as she said she would. Emily pushes Paige's hair back from her forehead, still slick from sweat as she runs her fingers over two old, small scars.

"What are these from?" Paige chuckles,

"Nothing as dramatic as yours."

"No, but they're cute."

"See? Scars can be cute." She turns her head so she can look at Emily, "Beautiful."

Emily still doesn't believe her. Not yet. Thinks she could get used to Paige trying to show her though.

"Um, the one by my eyebrow? I got when I was seven. I fell off my bike." And Emily has a vision of a young Paige, looking very much like she does now, hurtling through space and time over the handlebars of her bike. Then, as now, not letting anything stop her or get in her way. Always chasing what she wants, headstrong, fierce. She smiles indulgently, Paige looks at her curiously,

"The other one, near my hairline? Was at a stupid hat party in high school. Someone slipped something in my drink and I was dancing to impress some girl and fell over. Cracked my head open. She took me to hospital though and we dated through senior year, so it wasn't all bad."

Emily runs her fingers over the scars, down across her face, tracing her lips with her thumb.

"What hat did you wear?"

"Mm?" Paige is losing it a little at Emily's touch, not really able to focus on anything much apart from where her hand is moving next. Emily laughs,

"To the party. You said it was a hat party."

"Oh, um. I don't know, I thought it was a lame party, so I just wore a lame hat. I was a bit of a brat about it, so I probably deserved to get roofied." She shrugs, "Anyway, the party wasn't my sort of thing. They had some cupcakes, but they all tasted of old pennies, I just wanted a coconut one."

Emily nods, a smirk on her lips,

"Coconut cupcakes. I'll remember that when I invite you to any parties I may have."

Paige laughs,

"Yeah. Do that." She leans closer in, conspiratorially, "I get pretty pissed if all you have is vanilla."

Emily's stomach rumbles, and Paige remembers the take out. She's feeling pretty hungry herself, she skipped lunch and hadn't got round to making herself anything before Emily appeared. She reluctantly moves Emily's arms from where they're encircling her.

"Come on, superstar. Let's have food."

Emily follows her out of the bed, finding her panties from where she dropped them earlier, Paige hands her one of Holden's oversized New York Jets shirts and puts one on herself. She grabs Emily as she tries to walk out past her, pulling her in for a long, slow kiss, sliding her tongue into Emily's mouth. Emily pulls away after a few seconds,

"Don't or we won't leave and I really am hungry now."

They creep down to the kitchen, unaware as to whether Holden and Aria are home yet. They chuckle as they find Paige's shirt halfway up the stairs and stop again to kiss. Paige heats up the noodles in the microwave and roots around for some nibbles in the cupboards.

Aria and Holden are back just after midnight, both fearful, wondering how Paige is, what might have happened. The sight they're greeted with answers their fears. As they open the front door and move into the front room, the open kitchen door allows them to see, quite clearly, Paige sitting on the table, legs wrapped round Emily's thighs, bracing herself on her arms. They're kissing deeply, familiarly. Holden looks at Aria and smiles giving a thumbs up. They thought they'd made enough noise as they came in and wait expectantly for the pair to stop and look round, instead, Emily's hand slides down to the hem of Paige's shirt and slips underneath moving slowly upwards, over her hip, stomach, ribs, upward. At this point Holden turns away, coughing wildly. Aria starts laughing as Paige and Emily break apart, blushing,

"Oh, please, don't mind us."

Aria notices Paige wipe her thumb across her mouth and smile. Her legs are still wrapped around Emily, whose trying to act with decorum and as if she hasn't just been caught initiating sex with their housemate on the kitchen table. Holden wanders into the kitchen,

"Coffee?"

Emily finally breaks free from Paige's leg-grip and Holden walks past Paige planting a kiss on the top of her head, whispering,

"I'm really happy for you."

Paige brushes him off but, secretly delighted, she can't help but grin back at him.


	8. Chapter 8

**Hi, sorry it's been a longer wait than usual - couldn't get to grips with the chapter as I wanted, still not so happy, but bear with it. Thanks so much again for the people who review, guests and non-guests, it's such a pleasure to read what you're thinking and how you're responding to the story. **

**So, we're coming to the end of the fic - just tying up some loose ends and spending a little bit of time with them before we go! Apologies for the lack of quality again, but I hope you find something to enjoy.****  
**

Emily wakes up slightly confused. Her body is tingling, her breathing shallow, feels herself spiraling upwards, she gasps as she realizes she's lying on her side as Paige's nails are lightly raking over her nipple, gently pinching and palming her breasts as she variously sucks on her shoulder and presses open-mouthed kisses down her back, her shoulder blades, along the scars that encircle her shoulder and returning to nip and kiss her neck. Emily isn't sure how long Paige has been awake and doing this to her, but she's aware of the heat pooling in her stomach and the ache between her legs getting unbearable. She shifts further into her pillow and moans, as she feels Paige grin into her neck and murmur,

"Morning, beautiful."

Emily moans more loudly as Paige runs her hand down from teasing Emily's breast across her hip and around to squeeze her ass. Her legs spread and Paige's hand travels further down, until she stops, not quite touching, teasing. She props herself further up on her elbow to whisper in her ear,

"You still wet for me, Fields?"

"Don't tease."

Emily groans as she reaches her hand behind her so she can grab Paige's leg, where she lightly scrapes her nails over the skin she finds there. She gasps as Paige brushes against her, feeling her wetness and she chuckles, dipping a finger inside. Emily feels Paige begin to set up a rhythm, as she slips another finger in and gasps at the feel of Emily fluttering around her fingers. As she builds a steady rhythm she can feel Emily getting closer and closer, but not quite getting off, until Emily moves her hand to her clit, pants and moans getting louder and she comes with a sharp cry. She mutters something into her pillow as Paige holds her, feels her slipping into sleep again,

"What?"

"Body doesn't lie."

She feels Paige smile as she kisses the back of her neck and snuggles into her warm body.

Emily wakes an hour later, a little aggrieved to notice she's on her own. She yawns and stretches, feeling a dull ache in her body, and gets out of bed. Finding the shirt Paige got for her yesterday and retrieving her underwear from where they were thrown (for a second time) onto the floor, finally putting on her jeans, she pads slowly downstairs into the familiar, warm kitchen.

She's used to Saturday mornings in the house. But this one feels different as if the world has shifted on its axis and she'll always see it from a new angle. The three occupants look up at her expectantly from where they're seated around the table. Paige has obviously showered and is in the middle of animatedly telling a story, but she stops when Emily comes in. She grins up at her,

"Hey, sleepyhead."

"When did you get up?"

"Not long after you woke up for the first time."

She replies with a meaningful look and Emily flushes. She walks to the sink for some water, laying her hand gently on Paige's head. She doesn't know why, she doesn't want to kiss Paige in front of Holden and Aria, and it's the most intimate gesture she can think of to do. She 's rewarded by a goofy smile on Paige's face and Holden laughing,

"Oh. My. God." He turns to Aria. "Did you see that? Oh. You are _so smitten_ McCullers. Seriously, have you ever seen her like this?"

Paige glares at him and reaches behind her for a dish-cloth to flick at him. He protects his body with his arms, but carries on teasing her,

"Oh. Come _on_, Paigey, after having to see you make out all hot and heavy on the kitchen table last night, I'm entitled to have some fun."

They don't do much that day. Emily showers and they end up back in bed for the most of it, only getting up to eat, then make out some more, until the evening when they wander downstairs joining Holden and Aria. They call a take-out and agree to watch the zombie marathon Paige had lined up for herself last night. Paige sits in the corner of one of the squashy brown-leather couches and opens her arms for Emily to cwtch into.

That night is different. They take it slow, each act an act of exploration, the aim is the journey, not the destination. They spend time learning one anothers' bodies, what they like, what turns them on. They touch and taste and feel, until, exhausted again, they fall into a deep sleep, tangled together in tangled sheets.

**XXXXXX**

Paige is lying across her bed, head propped on pillows her arms encircling Emily who's resting against her. They've been awake for a while and have spent the morning kissing, talking. Paige crept downstairs at one point to fetch coffee and croissants that Holden left out for them. She feels like she has something important to ask, something she needs to say, so she takes a breath, then stops herself. Emily nudges her gently,

"What?"

"Nothing."

She feels Emily's laugh vibrate against her stomach, a low chuckle,

"Mm, see, when people say it like that, they don't mean 'nothing', they mean I want to say something really important and momentous,"

"Oh, ok, now you're gonna be real disappointed."

Emily shifts so she can look at Paige, plants a kiss on her jaw,

"Not possible."

"Yeah, sure."

"Paige. Don't. I want to know everything you say, everything you think. C'mon. What was it?"

She sees Paige steel herself, take a breath,

"Um, do you, do you believe in reincarnation? In past lives? Destiny?"

Emily frowns, looks puzzled,

"I don't know." She shuffles, a little uncomfortably,

"But, with the accident and all, you must think there's a _reason_, for why you survived? Maybe for why it happened in the first place? Some sense of _fate_?"

Emily shifts from Paige's arms so she can sit and look at her. She pulls the sheet round her and leans against the wall. Paige leans forward and takes hold of her hand, running her fingers across the back of Emily's. Emily looks down at where their hands are joined, says quietly, uncertainly,

"I guess. I spent so long trying to get over it and no one seemed to _want_ me to think about why, they just wanted me to be glad I survived." She cocks her head to catch Paige's eye, laces their fingers together, "why?"

"I just - I think - there must be a reason - for you to survive and come here, for us to meet. When I first talked to you, really talked, that night at the retreat, I felt like I'd known you all my life. It was so easy. Even though I still have so much to learn about you. It felt like somewhere in _here_," she indicates her chest, "you already were." She grimaces and attempts a laugh, but she means it so much that it's hard to joke. She passes her hand over her eyes and rubs them, then bites the side of her thumb, sighing, "You think I'm dumb."

Emily smiles,

"Never." And it's true, Emily's spent so long _not_ thinking or talking about the accident, because it upsets people, because they don't want to hear, because they can't cope with the thought of their own mortality, that she has never been able to articulate what she feels: about surviving, not dying, having a second chance. "I sometimes wonder if there's a reason. I-it seemed to matter so much when I was lying in the hospital getting better for so long - after all the skin grafts and the operations, it was all I did think about. But then it just became about getting better, getting well, rehab, learning to walk and move again and no one ever let me talk about it, or even asked me. And then people seem so uncomfortable talking about it - until you." Emily stops, shrugs,

"Do you think about it now?"

Emily looks back up at her, squeezes her hand, and thinks about how amazing it is that she should have found someone who will give her the space and the time to find out those things about herself: who she is; what she can be. Because she knows when she looks at Paige at that moment, that Paige won't let her settle until she has divined the answers to them. She swallows the tears that are pricking at her eyes, nods and smiles, says with a catch in her voice,

"Yeah. I do. But right now?" She grins at Paige, drops her hand and moves back towards the head of the bed, arms either side of Paige, hovering a breath away from her lips, "now all I'm thinking is how much I want you."

Emily smiles as she sees Paige's breathing hitch and a blush appear on her cheeks. She leans in and kisses her, moving so she's straddling Paige's hips, she presses herself gently down onto her. The gasp that comes from Paige's mouth gives Emily the opportunity to gently, gently slide her tongue into her mouth. As she moves her mouth to her throat and along her jawline, she hears Paige whisper,

"_God_, I love you."

**XXXXX**

The alarm that goes off at 5am Monday morning is a rude awakening for both of them. Emily tries, only half jokingly, to get Paige to miss training.

"Come on, Paige. We could miss it. We've never missed one." She's lying fully on top of Paige not allowing her to move. She kisses down her neck, her collarbone and trails back up to her mouth. Paige feels the heat in her stomach growing, but this practice is important. She laughs as she moves her head away from Emily's kisses,

"No, Em. You may not have missed any, but I have. Plus this could be my first meet back. It's prelim time trials today."

Emily pouts, so Paige leans up and kisses her,

"I don't have my costume."

"No. But we can swing by your room and get one, it's practically on the way."

"Paaaiige, please."

"Na-uh. Nope. Come on. I need a shower and so do you."

Emily perks up at that,

"Can we shower together?"

Paige nods.

They walk into campus together, calling in on Emily's room for her swimsuit. For both it feels strange. They're both nervous, wondering what people will think, if anyone will notice. Paige grows quieter and quieter the closer they get to the natatorium, Emily squeezes Paige's hand,

"You ok?"

Paige blows out a breath, half-smiles back at her,

"Sure."

Emily laughs,

"You're a lousy liar, McCullers. What is it? You worried about what people will say?"

"About us? No. N-not really, though I'd like to talk to Lauren before we show the whole world, and I think you should talk to Dani and Spencer." Emily agrees, nods, pulls Paige to a stop and looks at her,

"So?"

"Sooo. What if – " she starts, "What if my times are lousy? I need to get back into the team this week. If I don't make the cut this meet, I won't get to swim in the Divisionals." She turns away from Emily in frustration, "Urgh. I was going to train yesterday. But…"

Emily gives a wry grin,

"But instead we spent the whole day fucking. Yeah. I know. I had things to do too. But…" She shrugs, pulls Paige in towards her and whispers "I think we chose the best option."

Paige huffs and pulls away, sighs out,

"Em."

Emily realizes she's being serious and links their hands together again,

"Ok. One, let's see what your times actually _are._ Two, let's see what Coach says, 'cause she's the one who has final say on this. Three, let's deal with it when we know what we're actually dealing with."

Paige gives a little smirk back,

"That was quite the motivational speech, Fields."

"Yeah, well, it's better than you flipping out about it."

Emily sees Paige sigh, can see her forming arguments in her head, she leans forwards and kisses Paige's cheek, sees her smile as she determinedly pulls her towards the natatorium. They walk down the hallway, unconsciously dropping hands as they stop before the locker room door.

**XXXXX**

Brennan knows there's something different about Paige and Emily this morning, but at first she's at a loss. She runs the team through their warm-ups, then divides them into groups by stroke and distance and sets them their practice drills until it's time for the time trials. They're not the final ones, she won't make the final decision about the team until Thursday, giving her Friday to set them up and train them, making final tweaks and decisions about order and rankings then. But the timings on Mondays are useful for her, they give her a good indication of what her selection will probably be. She runs her eye over the girls in the pool in front of her. They're looking in good shape, she's proud of them, they've worked hard for her over the season and they're poised to get their reward in getting into the Divisionals. The meet this coming Saturday could be the one that seals their place, giving her the following meet where she can mix things up and try things out without it impacting too much.

She can see Emily's concerned about Paige, she's watching her closely and at first, Brennan's just relieved that they seem to be talking and are friends again. Then, she watches as, at a changeover they walk past one another, Paige leans in to whisper something to Emily who laughs in response, leaving her hand linger on Paige's arm a little too long, her eyes holding hers too intently and Brennan recognizes what it is. She's momentarily thrown off. Not because of the relationship for itself, she's been around teams and swimming in particular too long not to have seen it before, the touches, the looks, the closeness that comes in locker rooms; but because she's not sure how having her two best swimmers dating is going to affect the rest of the team. She smiles, then decides she'll talk to them, keep an eye.

But she too is worried about Paige. She had hoped that she'd be back to her best by this meet and she can see in Paige's eyes that she needs this. For all her reassurances, Paige is still worried about her scholarship, and she knows that Paige feels like she's let Brennan down. Unfortunately, Paige is way off her best, even just in the drills. Emily, on the other hand, is in another league this morning. She's swimming like Brennan's never seen before, with a grace and an energy that Brennan didn't think possible, and she knows she's having a glimpse of Emily's potential and she feels a twist of sadness for her. When they come to the time trial, Emily's already a second ahead of her previous best time this season, Brennan calls her out of the pool to congratulate her.

As she's clutching the stop-watch willing Paige on to a better time, she feels a presence behind her and turns slightly to see Emily, eyes fixed on the hands on the watch. As she presses the stop button, she angles it so Emily can see and hears a slight cry of frustration. Brennan turns to look at her,

"Two seconds out from where I'd like her to be."

Emily's holding a towel and gently scrunching the ends of her hair dry, she nods. Brennan squats by the side of the pool where Paige is waiting, she shakes her head and Paige grimaces, then looks across at Emily,

"How much?" Brennan answers,

"Two seconds, Paige. Can you rest for thirty then go again on my say?"

They watch as Paige swallows and nods. The result is the same at the end of the second lap. Brennan calls Paige out of the water, brushing off her protests. She asks them both to come to her office once they've showered and changed. Stepping up to the office door, Paige glances at Emily and grimaces,

"I feel like I'm being called to the Principals Office again."

"Did that happen to you a lot at school?"

"A bit, yeah." She sees Emily look askance at her, "Hey, mainly 'cause I got caught fighting when I was protecting Holden. And that was in Junior High. I was good all through High School." She muses for a moment, "Holden had taken up Tang Soo Do by that stage, so he could look after himself."

"Do you think we're in trouble?"

"Jeez, Em. We're not in school now, what 'trouble' could we be in?" But she's not feeling as brave as she's sounding, so she leans over and quickly kisses Emily's cheek. "Ok. Now or never, come on." She steps up and knocks on the door, bouncing slightly on the balls of her feet as they wait for an answer.

Brennan asks them to sit, so they take the chairs, side by side on the other side of her desk. Brennan senses their anxiety and smiles,

"Ladies, I'm sorry to call you in, there are a couple of things I need to talk to you about." She can sense Paige stiffen, sees her take on a dangerous mouth-set. "First I have something to ask and I hope you'll be honest with me."

Paige responds,

"Of course."

"Ok, a-are you in a relationship?"

Paige sits straight in her chair. She's not going to be intimidated or bullied. She's always respected Brennan, had no reason not to. She hopes that trust has been well-placed, she takes Emily's hand that's resting on her thigh as she holds Brennan's gaze, clear and direct,

"Yes."

Brennan smiles,

"Ok. Thank you for being honest with me."

"I'm not ashamed of who I am, nor is Emily - "

"Good. You know, if I can speak not quite as your Coach now, I'm really pleased for you." Paige looks slightly shocked and Brennan watches as Emily smiles, "You both deserve to be with someone special."

Paige's eyes widen,

"Wow, er, thanks."

"But, speaking _as_ your Coach, I have to wonder how it's going to affect the team." She clears her throat to continue and Paige shifts uncomfortably in her chair. "But, let's play it out and see how it goes. Ok?"

She watches the girls as they take it in, thinks how amazing love is, how you can see it shining off their skin collecting in the air around them as they look at one another. She clears her throat and their attention turns back to her, she's more confident, back on surer ground now.

"So. I wanted to talk about the meet on Saturday." She sees Emily sneak a look at Paige as she seems to deflate a little. "I'm not making any promises, but I'm going to leave it as long as possible to name my team for this week. Paige, I want you swimming for me, I need your experience and I need you as Captain out there in the team. But, you know my policy. If you're good enough, you swim, if not…" she shrugs and watches as Paige nods, "I don't play favours."

"I know, so what does that mean?"

"You're about two seconds off where you need to be right now."

Paige huffs and runs a hand through her drying hair, tucking a strand behind her ear, and Emily's feels a familiar pull and twist in her stomach at the motion, berates herself, that even sitting here in their Coach's office, her desire for Paige can flare. Paige's voice when it comes is flat,

"What can I do?"

Emily hates seeing her this way, has never seen her this way, she jumps in,

"We can add an extra training session later. I don't mind helping."

Paige looks at her with gratitude. Brennan nods,

"Yes. Some extra training could work. But I don't want you to overdo it."

"I can run some exercises with her." Emily's still eager, Brennan looks at her with curiosity,

"Ok. Let's try that. But _don't_ overdo it, please. Emily? I don't want you swimming any more, only at usual practice times." Emily nods, agrees, Brennan makes a move that is in effect a dismissal, Paige stands to go, but before Emily can join her, Brennan says, "Emily, could you stay for a couple of minutes? Thank you." She looks up where Paige is standing by the door. "I won't keep her long, thank you, Paige."

Paige gone, Emily turns back to find Brennan watching her with curiosity in her eyes,

"You up for this? It could 'cause some problems between you if she's not ready."

Emily nods, holds her gaze and Brennan is struck by a strength that she's never seen in Emily before. She wonders if it's something Paige noticed all along, considers how strong she needed to be to get over what happened to her.

"Yeah. I'll be ok. You know she really wants this?"

"I'm aware how much it means to her, Emily. I want her to be there too."

Emily watches Brennan, can see how much she means it and she feels a sense of pride in Paige, that she can inspire that in someone. Until that moment, she never really _got_ Brennan. Sure, she was grateful to her for giving her a second chance, she knew the program was good, but it was mainly Spencer being here that drew her to the College. She has a thought that she suddenly sees even more clearly what Paige was getting at with her talk of 'karma' and 'fate'. Perhaps Brennan, like Paige, was something and someone on her own path she was destined to meet.

**XXXXX**

That evening in the pool, they've been working for nearly an hour and Paige's frustration is beginning to show: she's becoming less focused, her strokes are tired and sloppy. Emily wonders if she should shut down their training, get something to eat and go home. She's watching Paige, trying to make sense of some of the drills that Brennan has given her. She's refrained from timing Paige, a thing that's just adding to her anger, but Emily knows that won't help. As she watches her setting off for another lap, Emily gets an idea, a moment of inspiration. She watches carefully as Paige goes into her turn and is suddenly sure she can make a difference, sure maybe an extra second could be wiped off her time. She waits for Paige to swim back to her, watches again as she makes her next turn, again, noticing the slight sloppiness in the push-off, in the twist of her body as it comes off the wall. Emily feels a glimmer, a point of hope, her body buzzing and she grins. She's still smiling when Paige surfaces in front of her, pulling her goggles off and dropping them on the tiles, resting her arms on the side of the pool, says angrily,

"What's got you so happy?"

Emily can recognize the tone, she's upset, angry with herself, the world, the unfairness that just as she got herself built up and strong, she got sick. Emily crouches down,

"I've got an idea. Something we can work on." She's excited, eyes are focused, sparkling,

"Yeah? Well, something better work."

"Ok. You trust me?"

"Emily." Paige breathes out in frustration, she can't deal with games, just wants her times to come down so she can swim, Emily rolls her eyes,

"Ok. Your turns. I think we need to work on your turns."

Paige looks up at her with suspicion, braces her arms on the side of the pool and pulls herself out,

"I worked on my turns last year."

"Well, I think you need to work on them again."

Paige glares at her, not in the mood to listen. She grabs a towel from off the bleachers and starts toweling herself down. Emily pulls her round to face her,

"Paige, listen to me. You're a little sloppy in your push-off – too far from the wall. I think if we work on it we could get at least a second off."

"Yeah? Well. I'm tired."

"Paige. What was it you said? 'Trust me.' Well, what about _you_ trusting _me_."

Paige huffs and holds her gaze, eyes still angry,

"Look, I get it. I get you were this great Olympic hopeful, but what makes you think you know anything about swimming 'fly?"

Emily steps back, a little hurt, says calmly, quietly,

"Ellie swam butterfly."

Paige stops dead. A rush of emotions pass over her face, she passes a hand over her eyes and grimaces at herself, breathes out,

"Em, I'm sorry."

"Ok, you weren't to know."

And Emily realizes that although she's never acknowledged it before, it's one of the things that she sees in Paige that makes sense of the vague resemblance between Paige and Ellie that she never properly admitted when they first met - the pull that drew her to her.

"I used to watch her train a lot. She had some issues with her turns too, our Coach tweaked them, I just wondered if it would work for you, but" she shrugs and smiles tiredly at Paige, "you're probably right. We'll have a chat with Coach Brennan tomorrow. Tell her I can't help."

Paige steps forward and takes Emily's hand, passing her thumb over the back of it,

"Sorry. I'm really sorry. I didn't know. I'm just frustrated. We can try it." She shakes Emily's hand, catches her eye, smiles, "Let's try it. If you've got time?"

"You sure?"

"Yeah. Come on."

They stay for another hour, Emily remembers what Coach Abong used to ask Ellie to do, the hours she spent watching Ellie, waiting for her sitting on the bleachers in USC's natatorium while she practiced and practiced. After the end of the hour, Paige hasn't quite got it, but she's close and she begins to trust Emily's confidence in it.

By the time she's showered and changed, Paige is exhausted. And hungry. She swings her bag on her shoulder and heads out to the corridor where Emily's waiting for her.

They train morning and evening for the next two days, still not timing Paige, but Emily's got an idea that her hunch is right and she's excited, buzzing. By Wednesday evening, Paige is just exhausted. She steps into the locker room after a quick shower, having left Emily to clear the pool area, to her phone ringing. Emily arrives back in the locker room just as Paige hangs up, she indicates the phone,

"Just Aria, wanting to know if you're coming for dinner. I said yes."

Emily pauses a moment,

"I don't know. You look pretty beat and I've been at yours all week."

Paige smiles, tiredly,

"They don't mind, Em."

"No, I know, but.."

"I like you being there. I mean, I love Holden and Aria, but –"

She steps forward and pulls Emily towards her by her belt loops kissing her, Emily leans into the kiss, then pulls back,

"Paige, you're still wet."

"Oh, yeah. Sorry." She begins toweling her hair dry, "Well?"

"Ok. If you're sure?"

Paige grins her response and carries on changing, winking at Emily when she becomes aware that she's checking her out as she changes.

Paige is pretty much beat, only just managing to get through dinner. Holden spends most of dinner teasing her, her mom phoned and Holden spoke to her,

"So, she told me to pass on how thrilled she is about you being together, but was pretty pissed you hadn't told her."

"I haven't really had much chance."

"No. I said you've just spent the last six days fucking." Paige's head snaps up to look at him and Emily gasps, Holden waits a beat then laughs, "of course I didn't. Though I think she kind of guessed that's why you've been 'busy'. I _did_ tell her you've been training loads though too." He looks at Emily, "she thinks you're pretty amazing, you know, asked me to pass on her love."

Emily smiles, shyly, as Paige looks at her and squeezes her hand,

"Yeah, she's a bit of a romantic."

"Huh, yeah, she's a big believer in fate and 'true romance' and all that." Holden's tone is only half-teasing. Emily bites her bottom lip, remembers the conversation she and Paige had, lifts her hand to push back a piece of hair that's fallen across Paige's face.

Almost as soon as she's eaten, Paige excuses herself and goes upstairs to bed, she leans down and kisses Emily, saying goodnight to Aria and Holden. Emily isn't tired yet, Holden offers to do the washing up and Emily jumps in,

"I'll help, i-if that's ok?"

Aria looks grateful,

"That would be amazing, I've got some reading I need to finish by tomorrow. So, if you guys don't mind?"

They chat about inconsequential stuff for a while, until Holden goes quiet. He pauses a moment and Emily sees a little of Paige in him at that moment, the hesitation, the consideration of the consequences of what he's going to say and again she's reminded of how they practically grew up together. It makes her smile. She turns to him to hear him out,

"I wanted to say thanks."

"What for?"

"For doing this for Paige. Helping her with her training."

Emily shrugs,

"It's nothing."

"It's not nothing. It means everything to her, swimming in this meet. She seems to think you're really helping and giving her a fighting chance. "

"Good." Emily recognizes how close they are, that between Emily staying over and swim training, they've still had time to talk about Paige and Emily, about Paige's swimming. She's mildly curious as to when. "I just want to help her. She's helped me so much already, I need to give something back to her."

"Look. I've got to admit, there were a couple of times when I just wanted to tell her to forget you. Tell her to move on. That you weren't the person she thought you were – all that stuff with Dani, when she was ill, you know? I gotta say, I thought you were pretty rough to her sometimes."

Emily winces a little, it's not nice hearing someone telling you your faults so boldly to your face, but she can sense his care for Paige, knows how Paige feels about him, so she's prepared to hear him out.

"But… I don't know, I guess I'm just trying to say I was wrong. I think she saw you for exactly what and who you were right from the beginning. Even before you had the chance to see it yourself."

Emily smiles, a little embarrassed,

"Thanks, I-I think."

"Emily, what I'm trying to say is, and I know you don't need it and I know Paige would kill me if she heard me talking to you like this, but, I'm so pleased you're together. I've seen the way you look at her, the way you touch her when you think no one's looking. I've never seen anyone treat her like you do, _love_ her like you do." He smiles and breathes out a sigh, "Ok, I'm rambling on. But really, thank you. She's had a hard time since she came out, her dad's reaction really knocked her confidence, made her think she'd never find anyone, that 'relationships like _that_'" he deepens his voice to mimic Paige's dad, "'will never work, are never natural'. She had to sneak around at High School so much that I think she just never believed it would happen for her. So… I don't know. It's none of my business I guess, but I wanted you to know." He looks away, a little embarrassed but also glad he's got it off his chest. He's shocked but grins like an idiot when Emily leans forwards and kisses him on the cheek, says,

"Thank you. I didn't realize it, but I needed to hear it."

**XXXXX**

Emily stays up another hour or so, until, with a yawn, she heads up to Paige's room. Paige has left a bed-side light on for her and Emily takes a moment to look around her. Of course, she's been in Paige's room before now, but she was kinda busy then. First, she watches Paige sleeping soundly. She's sprawled out on her front, and Emily feels a twist in her stomach as she watches her. She bends down to brush a piece of hair away from her face, careful not to wake her. She thinks back to the nights she spent in Paige's room in New York at her parents' house, trying to work out how to connect the two. There's the mess – the clothes on the floor – her college work, films and books spread all around; but there's no cut-outs from the paper, no pages torn from magazines; but there is a wall painted in blackboard paint on which she's scrawled fragments of dialogue from films, quotes from books and what looks like potential topics for papers and dissertations. In place of adverts for films from magazines, there are huge framed posters from old sci-fi, thriller and horror films – most of which Emily hasn't heard of - certainly never seen. She notices some bulging notebooks filled with words and drawings which she runs her hand over but doesn't open. She also sees, pinned up amongst the rest of the chaos on her noticeboard, the cover of the cd she gave Paige for Christmas and she studies it for a moment. She smiles, excited.

Emily hasn't had time since Friday to really take stock of what it really means, _being_ with Paige, being in a relationship with Paige. She could never believe that after Ellie she'd find someone she could be so much herself with. Someone she could let see all her sides. Even before Ellie, even whilst she was at school, she'd perfected the ability to let people only see what she wanted them to see. She had secrets. Secrets that could hurt her, damage her. So she kept herself hidden, never really letting anyone in. Until Ellie. Ellie had been so open, so honest, so able to break into Emily, to see her and who she was that when she died, Emily couldn't ever believe she would find someone like that again. Until Paige. As she watches her soundly sleeping she realizes how much she's been looking for someone like Paige. And she understands more and more what Paige meant when she said that she felt like Emily was already inside her – how she knew her before. At the time, Emily felt what it meant, but didn't understand it. Until now. Here. Standing inside Paige's messy room, watching her sleep with her heart hurting so badly she thinks she's having another panic attack. Until she realizes what it really is; what it really means; that it's the simplest thing of all: it's just love.


	9. Chapter 9

**Sorry for the delay things got away from me and then I had a whole chapter with lots of things to catch up on and get done before I was happy with it. This is the last chapter - there will be an Epilogue, but I think their story for the moment ends here. I achieved my goal of finishing a longer story so I'm happy about that.**

**Thanks so much for the people who've been reading and have kept reading and for all the reviews, likes, favorites and follows. I hope it's been worth the time and effort you've put in to reading it. Please enjoy.**

Paige feels stronger than she has for months, can feel her strength powering her through the water. As she counts down to the wall she thinks of Emily: falters momentarily as she thinks of Emily counting down for Ellie, counting down to her own death, (she told her this as she held her in her room at New Year, how she counted down to her death as she waited and waited for her rescuers to never come) then re-gains her beat as she thinks of Emily counting down for her, she can feel her willing her on; feels the tug of the thin thread that links them both, one to another, the line that love can spin. Takes her turn exactly on time, pushes through her legs, feels light as she powers through the water. Her stroke is good, she's near to the sweet spot she recognizes, but not there yet: upsweep, breath, in-sweep, pull, upsweep, in-sweep, pull, repeat, repeat, don't get tired, fight it don't feel it: the last lap, her muscles screaming, shoulders tightening, trying to keep her count, keep the stroke regular.

Emily's watching Brennan's stopwatch over her shoulder, the towel she was using to dry her hair momentarily forgotten and trailing in the pool of water she's created. She's holding her breath, counting as Paige counts, eyes flicking from the watch-face to the pool. There's a crowd starting to gather, willing Paige on – they want her there, swimming with them. There's a collective hush, a pause in the air around the pool that Brennan can feel. As Paige touches, Brennan stops the watch, gathers herself a moment before she takes a look, hears Emily's breath release behind her. Looks at her watch, curses quietly a moment, steps to the pool-edge and crouches down,

"Still a 1/10th off."

Paige can barely catch her breath but she holds Brennan's gaze,

"I can do it. Get it back. By the meet. You know I can."

Brennan deliberates a moment, then, almost imperceptibly, she nods, stands up and smiles. The rest of the team erupts into cheers and applause as Paige hauls herself out of the pool. Emily was close enough to hear, was close enough to have seen the time on the watch, looks curiously at Brennan, who sends her a warning glare, asks her to come to her office once she's showered.

In the locker room Emily watches, delightedly as the team crowd round Paige, congratulating her, slapping her on the back and Paige grins in response. Emily unconsciously moves away from the crowd – still hiding herself and her mess of a body as she heads to the shower.

Paige is taking a breather in the locker room. She's not going to wait for Emily, she needs to catch up on some college work and they'll meet later tonight. As Paige is sitting on the benches absentmindedly tying her shoe-lace, Lauren drops down beside her and gives her a little pat on the back,

"Hey, captain. Good news."

Paige can't help but grin at her, breathes out an exaggerated sigh of relief,

"Yeah. At one point I thought I wouldn't get there. But…" she shrugs,

"I'm really glad – it's not been the same without you there, you know."

"Thanks." Paige glances at Lauren, she's still not sure what footing they're on, they've not really spoken since New Year only locker-room banter and Paige feels like she owes her something – she likes Lauren, would like to keep her as a friend. She's about to speak when Lauren cuts her off,

"I'm really pleased about you and Emily, you know?"

"Wh-what?" Paige is taken aback, snaps her head up to look at Lauren,

"Come on, Paige. I'm not dumb – the others might be, but," she shrugs. Paige takes a breath,

"Yeah. Ok. Um," she's not sure where the conversation goes from here and is relieved when Lauren continues for her,

"Look, Paige. I'm not gonna say it's easy for me to see, but I like Emily and I know you've got a thing for her, so,"

"Thanks, I think." She shakes her head, "Sooo, how did you know?"

"If you look hard enough it's easy to see."

"Do the others?"

"Not yet. But you're neither of you good at hiding it, you know, regardless of what you think." She waits a beat, "Why? You trying to keep it a secret?"

"No. Not really, there are some people we wanted to know before we made it public, but…. No."

"Good."

"Yeah."

They sit for a moment in companionable silence until Lauren stands up and squeezes Paige's shoulder, as she goes to leave Paige says,

"Um, Lauren, can we try and go back to being friends? I kind of miss you."

Lauren smiles, shrugs, says

"I guess. Hey though, does this mean Dani's back on the market now?" as she disappears round the corner, Paige chuckles, gets her stuff together and leaves.

**XXXXXXX**

Emily's deep in thought as she walks back across the quad to her room, she's considering what Coach Brennan has said to her and she knows she has to make some decisions – all of a sudden there's a world of possibilities. The first person she wants to speak to is Paige, but she also needs to have some time to herself. Everything seems to be moving so fast that she's in danger of it all running away – from feeling she had no future, no possibilities, no clue, she suddenly feels as if everything is opening up in front of her and as much as she's excited, she's also scared. Feels as if she's hanging on desperately as life starts to take hold of her. She's so wrapped up in herself that she doesn't notice the figure standing waiting for her in front of her building, impatiently checking her watch.

"Emily. Thank God. I've been waiting ages."

"Spencer! Hi. How are you?"

"Good. Good. Where've you been? I've been trying to call since the weekend. Are you ok?"

Emily's lost for a few moments, suddenly realizes she hasn't checked her phone since Friday when she went over to Paige's. Opening her door gives her a few moments to gather herself until she turns and looks at Spencer holding her door open for her to come in.

"I'm fine, Spence. I just didn't have my phone to hand."

"For a _week_?"

Spencer glares at her and part of Emily just wants to laugh, to let it all go. She knows Spencer can be uptight, but she also knows how to get round her – how not to be intimidated by her. She sighs as she takes off her coat and heads to her kitchen area.

"Coffee?"

Spencer nods,

"Oh, but, not that instant stuff you gave me last time. Damn gave me palpitations."

Emily wants to say something about Spencer having perpetual palpitations but stops herself, prepares the coffee pot. She can feel Spencer's glare burning through the back of her head and smiles.

"So? Where've you been?"

"With Paige."

"For a _week_?"

Emily stops and looks at Spencer, she grins as realization suddenly dawns on Spencer's face, says,

"Yeah, for a week."

"Oh, uh, ok." Spencer's momentarily lost for words, she's unsure about her ground here. She's torn a little, she can see how happy Emily is and she can't deny that it's since she and Paige have been hanging around that Emily's been lighter, happier, but at the same time, she still doesn't 100% trust Paige.

Emily's waiting for Spencer's reaction, finally setting the cup of coffee in front of her she settles down on the couch opposite Spencer and tucks her feet under herself.

"It's good, Spence. She's what I want. I _know_ you don't like her, but I don't think you knew her when she was with Dani. I don't think she knew herself then. I think she was scared and insecure and never believed that she could find something good, and real." Emily remembers Holden's words from before.

Spencer takes a measured sip of the coffee, tilts her head in surprise at how drinkable it is, then sighs, says,

"And you think she does now?"

"I really do."

"Ok then."

Emily grins in response. She waits a beat, "So do you think you can make an effort with her?"

Spencer makes a face, takes another swig of coffee,

"Guess I can try."

"Well. That's a start. Look, Spence, I know it's a cliché, but she makes me feel like I have a future - that I have hope. She makes me feel like I can do anything – like a – a – a springboard or something." She runs her hand across her eyes, smiles ruefully, "I don't know, but… I feel like she's what I've been looking for. All my life. That she lets me be the best me that I can be."

Spencer goes to reply, she can snark, can slap Emily down, but when she looks at her, talking about the girl she's so obviously fallen in love with, she shrugs, leans forward and squeezes Emily's hand,

"Then, I guess, I'm gonna have to get used to her being around."

**XXXXXXX**

Emily wakes in the morning early, pale light filtering through the curtains. She shifts a little so she can watch Paige as she sleeps beside her. She's sprawled on her front, head turned away from her. Emily runs her hand over Paige's back, along her shoulders and down her arms, amazed that she can do this, and can feel this twist and dip in her stomach every time she touches, looks. Paige stirs slightly at her touch, mutters and turns to face Emily who kisses her forehead gently. Eventually, Paige wakes properly, smiles sleepily as she shuffles closer to Emily and presses a kiss against her clavicle, mouth hot, breath warm, as her tongue sneaks out and Emily gasps and laughs. Emily runs her hand over Paige's side languidly, reaching down to cup her ass she squeezes and pulls Paige closer to her until they're pressed together, breath mingling, heavy, the space between them filled with desire. Paige is the one to finally bring their mouths together, she slips her tongue into Emily's mouth, a hand into Emily's hair as she gently pushes at Emily until she's lying on her back, Paige straddling her, she grins into her mouth, moves until she can whisper,

"Well, that escalated quickly."

Emily reaches up, palming a breast with one hand with the other she pulls Paige towards her until they're kissing again, tongues sliding together, nipping and biting at lips. Paige lowers herself down Emily's body, flicks her tongue over a nipple, gently biting, hearing Emily gasp above her. She moves slowly to the other nipple, gently biting and licking over it. Emily bends forwards and kisses Paige's forehead, eyes meeting. Paige runs her tongue across hips, into belly button as Emily grasps at her back, with fingers and nails, Paige knowing there'll be marks but not really caring. She slips between Emily's legs, kisses into the crease of her thighs, along Emily's thigh to her knee and then back again, hovering over her centre she teases, eyes locked with Emily's until she moves to the other thigh, gently biting and kissing, back again, where she grins, wickedly, watching as Emily's head falls back when she gently, gently runs her tongue along Emily's slit, up to her clit where she ghosts her tongue over it, feeling Emily shudder above her. She slides her tongue again and again, eventually bringing her mouth to cover Emily's clit and runs her tongue over it. Emily's fist tangles in her hair, one in the sheets, until Paige has to move an arm to hold her hips down as Emily's orgasm shudders through her. Paige hums into her, smiling, until she eventually comes down. She uses her thumb to wipe her mouth and Emily feels her wetness pool again, reaches down and pulls her up to where she can kiss her, until Paige pulls back, says,

"Morning, beautiful."

"Hi."

They lay for a while, wrapped together waiting for the alarm to go off. Emily runs her hands over Paige's back, her shoulders and arms,

"I love your shoulders."

"Thank you."

"Though, you know, your right is a little more developed than your left."

"Yeah. It's always been a fault – from when I used to swim more freestyle – I breathe to my left, so.." she shrugs. Emily considers,

"Well. We can probably work on that in the summer, weights and stuff."

Paige laughs and shifts to where she can look at Emily,

"Oh, so, you're hanging around for the summer, huh, Fields?"

Emily grins back at her,

"Well, I thought I might. You know, I don't really have anywhere better to be. Although, if I _do_ find something more appealing."

She laughs as Paige huffs and leans forwards to kiss her.

**XXXXXX**

Paige is nervous before the meet. She didn't realize quite how much she wanted this, needed this to go well for her. She's been Captain for nearly two years now, so she's used to expectations, used to being relied on. But things have shifted now. She has people she wants to make proud of her – she wants to repay Coach: for her support, for her faith; and she wants to prove herself worthy of Emily. She hasn't said any of this. She knows they'd shoot her down if she said it, but it's there, in the set of her shoulders, the bow of her head, the outline of her back as she stands with her hands in the pockets of her sweats.

They're waiting for the bus to take them to the next state. Emily's talking to Brennan, every now and then she looks over, catches Paige's eye and smiles. Paige is confused when she realizes someone's talking to her,

"Paige! You ok?"

"Lauren. Hey." Paige tries to straighten up, regain her swagger, but she knows her fear is there even in the curve of her back. Lauren tilts her head, smiles,

"Ok?"

"Yeah. Course. You?"

Lauren looks at her,

"You'll be ok."

"What d'you mean?"

Lauren shakes her head,

"You'll be ok. Don't put too much pressure on yourself. We'll be fine. Everyone's in peak form."

Paige slouches lower into herself,

"Yeah, except me."

"Well, then, we'll pick you up. You know you always swim better in competition. You know Coach is always balling you out about it."

Paige goes to retort, starts, then stops,

"But what if I can't this time?"

"You will. I know you will. Look, Coach is no fool, nor is she sentimental, she didn't think you could do it, she wouldn't ask you to. Plus, we got Fields swimming for us now. You see her the other morning? She was _flying_."

Lauren stops when she sees a flicker of something pass over Paige's face, steps forwards and touches her arm,

"Oh. I see."

"What?"

"You're worried about letting _Emily_ down." It's a statement, not a question. Paige looks away. "You shouldn't. She won't love you any less."

"Yeah. Maybe."

"Come on. She adores you. It's quite sickening really." Paige turns her body slightly from Lauren, "Paige, don't be an idiot. For one, you're not going to let anybody down. You're not going to let the team down, Coach down, or Emily down. This is a _team_ thing. You're no bigger, no more important than any of the other swimmers. You're the one who's always said that."

Paige nods, slowly,

"I guess."

"You know I'm right." Lauren's tone turns teasing, "You think you're the big-shot? You're not. Any one of us could have a bad day and you'd be the first to pick them up and stop them from beating themselves up. You know no one will blame you. _Least_ of all, Emily."

Paige blows out a long breath. She takes her hands out of her pockets and smiles at Lauren.

"Yeah. Ok."

**XXXXX**

As they board the bus, Emily waits for Paige to settle. She's checking the team, back in Captain mode, answering questions checking everyone's ok and Emily remembers the first time she really took notice of Paige, back at the beginning of the season, how she noticed the respect she has for the other swimmers, her concern at their welfare, how she checked on the new girls making sure they were feeling ok, settling in, how she checked on her - gave her time, gave her space. She knows, even though Paige has said nothing to her, that she's finding this hard, that she's worried, about not being good enough, or strong enough and Emily takes comfort in the fact that for the first time, she can give some grace and time back to her.

Paige checks something with Coach, then takes her seat beside Emily, sighing as she rests her back against the seat. She finds Emily's hand with her own and entwines their fingers together and Emily can see her settle, rest, momentarily comforted. She has an urge, a desire to lean over and kiss her, she settles for squeezing her hand instead. It's going to be a long drive.

"Everyone ok?"

"Sure. Donnelley's being a pain in the ass as usual, but – " she shrugs, tries to make a joke, catches Emily's eye and has to look away.

"What?" Paige just smiles. "Tell me."

"I'm scared, Em. What if I let everyone down today? What if I'm not ready?"

"You know you won't."

"Yeah, that's what Lauren said."

"Ahh, I wondered what you guys were talking about."

"Yeah. She said the same, I'll pull it out the bag, always swim better in competition, blah, blah, blah. But, what if I don't?"

"You think Coach has made a mistake?"

Emily sees Paige smile as she sighs and says,

"Yeah. Ok. You got me." She waits a beat, then, quietly, "But, it's not just Coach I'm scared of letting down."

"Well. The team just want you back swimming with them, so …" Emily trails off as she sees Paige's look of frustration, "Oh. You mean _me_? Paige, that's not gonna happen."

"I bet you never had to worry about Ellie."

"Is this what this is about? You're comparing yourself to Ellie now?"

Paige shifts a little uncomfortably at Emily's tone, rubs the back of her neck,

"I bet she never made you feel like you had to pick up those extra few seconds to make sure we win."

"Paige." Emily's beyond frustrated now, "I'm not even gonna talk about this." She unclasps Paige's hand, "You're not Ellie. I don't want you to be Ellie, I want you to be you. God, you're so frustrating."

"I know. I'm sorry. I can't help it." Emily rolls her eyes and Paige laughs a little, "I know, I'm just a competitive person."

Emily takes her hand again, intertwines their fingers,

"You are, in many ways," she catches Paige's eyes, "but it's really very sexy and I really want to kiss you now."

Paige moans quietly and swallows,

"I don't think the team's quite ready to see us making out in the front of the bus."

"No."

"And I don't think Coach would appreciate it either. We did make a promise."

"Yeah."

"You gotta stop staring at me like that, Em."

"Sure."

But she doesn't until Paige doesn't care, only wants to feel Emily's lips on hers, her heart beat against her own and she leans forwards, so that the girls who knew smile and the ones who didn't are left in no doubt.

A few moments later they break apart. Paige sighs, then remembers something that's been bothering her, says,

"Em? What did Coach want the other day?"

Emily looks momentarily puzzled, then realizes what Paige means,

"Oh. After the time trial? She wanted to talk to me about my future."

Paige raises an eyebrow.

Emily thinks back to the conversation. It started with some small talk and a little discussion of how Coach thought Paige would do in competition, justifying her decision, wanting to repay Paige's loyalty and her determination. Eventually, she took a breath and leaned back in her chair,

"So, Emily. You have any plans beyond College?"

"No. Not yet." It all seemed too early for Emily. Here she was just getting her life back together, getting together with Paige, she just wanted time to let all that sink in.

"Ok. Well. I just want to throw this out there." She glanced at Emily, saw a slight nod, an acquiescence before she continued, "You live and breath and work for swimming. But you can't do what you once thought you'd do. The Olympics and a career are beyond you now. I know I'm speaking candidly, but I think you know everything I'm saying?" Again, she waited a moment for Emily to nod before continuing.

"But still swimming is _inside_ you, it's a part of you in a way it is for very few people. Even Paige. She's starting to move on, I've seen it before. She'll swim for me next season, she'll do great, but once her College career is over, it'll be over for her. And so it should be. She has other dreams, other futures."

Emily almost protested, but she could sense that Coach had seen this before, was telling her for her good.

"When she tells you, she'll be worried about it, she'll think it's going to be a let down for you. But it doesn't have to be. She can do whatever she wants to do."

Emily looked her in the eye, smiled,

"I know." And at that moment, she believed her and knew that whatever it was that Paige wanted to do she would do it at full throttle and would dedicate herself to it. She felt a thrum in her body at the prospect of a future – a future for Paige and with Paige. She smiled as much to herself as Coach. Brennan continued,

"But I want to talk about you. I think you love swimming too much to just let it go and I've noticed something about how you relate to people – the way you've handled Paige through her return to training, how you've coped with your own training – your own regimes." Brennan takes a breath, "Emily have you considered coaching? I know it's not the same as competitive swimming, but I think you have something. I don't mean what I'm doing – Collegiate stuff" she waved away Emily's protests, "I mean something bigger – Olympic, national, whatever you want."

Brennan sat back waiting for Emily's response.

"I just think you should think about it. But I want to help you. How about you do some coaching with me next year?"

Emily thought about it, brain whirring - it's potential. It's the first thing she's ever been presented with that makes sense, that makes her shoulders drop and her breath exhale.

She tells Paige about Coach's proposal on the journey to the meet. Paige holding her hand, lightly running her thumb over the back of it. Emily trying to work out how Paige feels about it, what she thinks about it. She doesn't say anything about what Brennan had to say about Paige, she'll leave that for now, it's not important. She wants to hear what Paige has to say – relies on her instinct now. Paige cocks her head,

"So? How's it feel? Now you say it out loud? Does it seem like something you'd want or does it fill you with fear and loathing?"

Emily takes a moment, knows the answer,

"Good. It feels good."

Paige smiles, leans forward and kisses her gently,

"Then you have your answer. Tell Coach yes." She takes a moment to think, "though, I'm not sure about you giving me orders, Fields."

"Oh, sure. You love it."

**XXXXX**

Brennan's beaming. The meet's better than they could have expected: the team's in fantastic form, Emily's cruised her way to victory in all her races and Paige was right when she said she'd make up the 10th of a second she was down to come in a respectable second place. There's just the relay teams left to sort out, and she has a hunch, to just change one thing. She calls Emily over to her.

"I want Paige in the final relay. What d'you think?"

Emily looks slightly taken aback, looks at her quizzically,

"Um."

"Think she can handle it?"

"Of course. But Narcizo'll be upset."

Coach smiles at how Emily worked out whose place Paige would be taking, she's impressed,

"Why Narcizo?"

"She's the weakest link."

"Yeah. She's worked hard for me, but the New York team is _good_. They know she's the weak link they'll target her and she'll fold. She's great in breaststroke, but her freestyle is suspect." Brennan challenges Emily, "What would you do?"

Emily goes to answer, takes a moment to consider, then nods, consenting with Breannan's decision,

"I'd keep her in the earlier rounds but not for the final race. Rest Paige, then put her in later."

"Ok then, that's what I'll do." She smiles as Emily starts to panic,

"You mean you wouldn't have _before_? You can't take my word for it. What would _you_ have done?"

Brennan grins at Emily's flustered reply,

"Well now, _that _you'll never know."

**XXXXX**

Heading to the last race of the evening and they're in a good position, their only rivals for the spot in Divisionals is, as Brennan predicted, the team from New York. She calls the girls together, congratulates them on their performance, then,

"Ok. I'm calling it for the final race. You've all been amazing today and throughout the season and this is, as you know, a team game, I've always told you that. And for that reason I'm changing the line-up for the final relay." She waits a moment as the anticipated buzz builds up, then dies down. She catches Narcizo's eye, "Dana, thank you, you swam a fantastic 100, but the 400 requires something more. You helped us get to this position where we are now and I want you to be proud of that." She smiles as Narcizo sighs, disappointed, but she's tired, she won't argue this one, "But I'm going to ask Paige to step in for this race."

Paige looks up, surprised,

"You sure?"

"Why, Paige? You telling me you can't do it?"

"No, no. I just. I –"

"You're fresh. Your races were much earlier and you were looking strong even towards the end. Just tell me, how are you feeling? You want to do it? You think you can do it?"

"Sure, Coach. Yeah. I'm in."

"Good. Just make sure you warm up."

Paige watches as Lauren and Shelby pace in front of her, psyching themselves up, getting into the zone, nervously checking and re-checking, hat, goggles, checking out the timer on the walls. Then, she turns to see Emily, cool, she's already got her hat and goggles on, she's plugged into her music and Paige smiles, knowing she's listening to Mahler, classical music that she told Paige she used to listen to with her dad on her way to meets at school, at county and how listening to it calms her, sends the world into soft focus, reminds her of her dad and how he told her she was the best. Paige has never seen anyone so calm at a meet as Emily, she stands, alone, poised, graceful, effortless, just like she is in the water. And Paige is amazed, honoured to know her, to love her, to be with her. She knows she's the opposite, she's bouncing, she too is plugged in, but she needs her awareness, needs to psyche herself up by being fully in the moment, senses sharpened, body ready.

She's watched Lauren give them a great start, two lengths ahead as Shelby dives into the water. The New York girl is good, Paige watches as she closes the gap, half a length shaved off by the end of the first turn, a full by the next turn and as they pull down the final length she's focused on chasing Shelby down.

Paige shrugs off her warm-up top, steps up to the block, laces her fingers together and focuses on her breathing, on the spot in the water where Shelby's hand will touch. Until, suddenly, the noise of the natatorium stills, her breathing calms as she feels a hand on her upper arm, a gentle touch and a warm voice whisper in her ear,

"Bring me home, McCullers."

Paige smiles, feels adrenaline course through her veins, watches with intent as Shelby comes in to touch, grins, says,

"Every time."

**XXXXX**

As she wheels her bike across the quad, Paige curses involuntarily: she was hoping the rain was going to hold off or just drizzle – not pour down. She hunkers down into her coat, it's still cold and she's grateful for its warmth. She heads across campus, making her way from Lauren's room to Emily's. As she gets to the student apartment block, she locks her bike and slips into the building as a girl leaves, making her way up to Emily's room. She knocks and stands with her back to the door, turning only when Emily opens it,

"Hi, Paige! What're you doing here?"

"Hey, Em. I just wanted to see if you –" her brain short-circuits as she finally takes note of what Emily's wearing: short, short denim cut-offs and a loose off-shoulder blue shirt, "um, hi."

Emily smiles and moves back into the room, holding the door so Paige can come in. Paige hurriedly shrugs off her wet coat and drops it to the floor, eyes roaming quite openly over Emily. She's regained a little composure as she moves with a little more swagger and slides her hands round Emily's waist, gently bending forward to kiss her neck. The loose material of Emily's top bunches under one of Paige's hands and she rests that hand on the skin on Emily's hip, running her thumb gently over it. She moves closer, kissing Emily, sliding her tongue into her mouth she delights in feeling Emily sigh and press tighter against her. They kiss, then come up for breath, resting foreheads together, Paige sighs,

"Hi."

"Hi, um," Emily bites her lip, "I wasn't expecting to see you until tonight."

"No. I came to take you out for lunch, but, now I'm here, I think I'd like to maybe stay in."

Emily breathes out a laugh and kisses Paige, sighing into her mouth,

"It's good to see you." Kisses again, and again, "I missed you last night." And again, then, "I love you _so_ much."

She's slightly put out when, as she goes in for another kiss, Paige pulls away from her. Keeping her hands on her hips, she dips her head and won't catch Emily's eyes when she tries to look at her.

"What?"

Paige's voice, when it comes, is hoarse,

"You've never said that before."

"No?" Paige shakes her head, "I haven't? How weird." Emily smiles and shakes her head, "I think it all the time."

Paige looks up, gives a shy smile,

"Yeah?"

Emily leans forwards, kisses her again, pulling her towards her,

"Yeah."

Emily's too slow to react when she sees the wicked glint in Paige's eye as she takes advantage of Emily's distraction and acts on a hunch, she runs a hand under Emily's top, pausing when she reaches her destination, to palm and run her thumb over Emily's bare breasts. Emily gasps, feels the familiar drag in her stomach and the butterfly-flutter starting again. They smile into the next few kisses as Emily walks Paige backwards until she hits the bed, dropping to a sit and Emily straddles her lap.

They kiss, as Paige slides her hands round until one is under Emily's ass, the other resting on her bare thigh. Emily drops her head to give Paige better access to her neck as she starts to nip and suck at the tender skin by her pulse point, kissing gently before she leaves a mark, and moves on to the next point. Paige raises her head to find Emily's lips again, kissing her deeply, softly as Emily sighs at the feel of her lips moving softly, slowly against hers. Emily moves her hands up Paige's arms until they rest momentarily on her shoulders, then fist into her hair, pulling her close, closer, closer still. After minutes of kissing, they pull back, come up for air, Emily says, a little breathlessly,

"So, you said something about food?"

Paige whispers back,

"Nah. I don't think so.."

Emily laughs, leans in for another kiss. Paige grins,

"Um. Hey, we've never done it here before." She motions behind her at the single bed she's currently sitting on, and despite herself, Emily's breath hitches,

"N-no. It's not the most comfortable."

"Feels ok to me."

"It's orthopaedic. Helps with my back."

Paige runs her hands under Emily's top, over her back, her shoulder blades, one down by her hip, running along the band of her shorts towards the button, where she stops as Emily laughs, dips her head,

"Paaige."

Paige leans forward, fingers toying with her button and whispers in her ear,

"You gonna tell me to stop?"

Emily bites her lip and shakes her head, reaching behind Paige she lifts her top over her head, Paige helping to shrug it off, then moves her hands to the clasp of Paige's bra, she leans in,

"No. But. You're wearing too many clothes."

**XXXXXX**

In the afternoon, with the rain battering against the windows, to the sound of water dripping intermittently from the broken drain outside Emily's window, with the curtains billowing and the sounds and shouts of life passing below them, they fuck with a joy filled with innocence, filled with gravity, filled with future and with present. They talk then they fuck some more, until with tired, sweating bodies they lie side by side and drift into sleep. Later, when Paige wakes she's aware that the rain has stopped and the light from the window is pressing up against Emily's body, throwing the outline of the muscles of her arm into sharp relief. As Paige's heart twists she thinks how lucky she is, how lucky, knowing, somehow, she's found her home: a place where she loves and _is_ loved. Emily stirs and starts to wake and Paige leans forward, closing her eyes into her future.


	10. Epilogue

**Before we start just some thanks to all the people who read and stuck with the story and who followed, favorited and especially reviewed it, thinking in particular of Roooonie (sorry if I've missed out an 'o'), photogirl21, Del, lettykoalamelomane, cooljuli000, LoveyourLife98 (who left the **_**best**_** review for Chapter 7), ficlovindancer, Bokononcradle, Breezy03, BrittanyMetzler, SevenSixteen, waiting-all-night, michelle, NotWriteintheHead, Anpn23456789, hipnos777, Departed, Meeeeeeee-D, and most of all saii79 who never fails to take the time to read & review; plus all the guests (or the just one guest who reviews a lot). If I've missed anyone I'm really sorry. **

**Ellie813 left a lovely review and lots of questions on the last chapter – don't worry no offence taken, so to answer those & the one from Ffion E – I'm from the UK – English but lived in Wales for (a long time). You pronounce cwtch with a 'u' like in 'cushion'. The reason I spell realise with a 'z' is because my spellchecker corrects it to 'z' and I can't be bothered to change it back even though I type it with an 's' each time.**

**I hope the first paragraph of this epilogue appeases paulinemcc – sorry if it annoyed you last time, it was always the intention to reveal the result of the meet in the epilogue. So here we go for the final time (it's very short but says all I think we need to know):**

**EPILOGUE**

"_Bring me home."_

"_Every time."_

We won the meet. I swam that leg like I've never swum before, finishing a good two lengths ahead of the New York swimmer. In fact, so far ahead that Emily was able to cruise home (much to Coach Brennan's disgust, she bawled her out for it afterwards, but I don't think Emily cared). When Emily touched me, it felt more than a connection, more than our usual connection, it was as if she 'passed on' something, her speed, her ability, it was like I was flying through the water – I was focused, fast, hit my turns like I'd trained to every time. It was as if all the aches and pains in my body fell away and all I could feel was pure adrenalin, pure speed.

We ended up winning Divisionals that year and the next, each time with me and Em on the relay – pretty much unbeatable –I don't think we lost a race all that next season. In fact, I don't think we lost a meet, mainly thanks to Emily.

I've just got off the phone from her. She's going to be late and it sounds like she's had a tough day. She helps out sometimes at the local Physio centre, motivational stuff for ex-athletes like her, kids who've lost something, sometimes someone. She loves it. Says it takes her out of her comfortable life and her entitled world, but I know Emily, I see how much it takes out of her and today sounds like it was particularly difficult – a girl who'd been in a car accident, lost her sister, lost her dad, and who can only remind Emily of herself, or of Ellie or of any other of those kids who died that terrible day. She doesn't phone to complain, Emily would never do that, said she just wanted to hear my voice and tell me she'll be late and that she loves me. When she gets in, I know she'll need me to listen and to hold her, to touch her and make her believe her world is still safe, still here. That her home is still full of the things we've built around us, the stuff of a life that signifies we're still alive - that we're not going anywhere.

Looking round my writing room, I can see the blue jug Emily found for me in an old junk shop that she loves because it's the colour of our old College swim-team hoodies. The tapestry blanket that we lay under on the cold nights when we first got a place together just the two of us and we couldn't afford to turn the heating on. Emily doesn't know it, but I still wrap myself up in it now, even though we could afford to have the heating on 24/7 if I wanted: It's old, stained and ripped but it smells of us. I can see all the things we've collected over our 7 years together. Over the desk is a black and white picture of us from one of our first holidays. Em had it framed for my birthday last year. A local woman took the photo for us, the weekend we went to Rhode Island. It was windy, mid-winter and our hair was being whipped up around us, the waves behind us rough and wild, but we're standing together and we look happy: Emily's laughing at some dumb joke I'd made, and I'm just watching her laugh, I don't think I even noticed the photo being taken. When it got just too cold for her to stare at the sea any longer, we found a deserted café near-by where we ordered hot chocolate and spent the rest of the afternoon until the light started to fade and we wandered gloved hand in gloved hand back to our hotel.

It hasn't always been easy. Not all the time. Especially our third and fourth years together: we were still learning one another, how to be with one another, how to share a life with another human and look out for them and not just ourselves: how to be a grown-up. After a particularly bad round of arguing we even tried a trial separation, Emily moved back to her mom and dad's. She was back within a week, carrying a little bundle of abandoned puppy – Lily, a black lurcher with a white-tipped tail and one white paw and a little crooked smile. She's four, my constant companion while Emily's at work, and all our little family now.

So, we work through our bad days and celebrate the good - Emily's the person I've chosen to spend my life with and we move through this world together. If you believe in Fate and Destiny, then that's all well and good, but I've learned that after that there's hard work, choices to be made and a good deal of luck and love. And we have love in abundance: it's in the small moments in our lives that we share, the smile she gives me when we wake up together, the kiss when she comes home at night; the secret afternoons when we should be working, but we dance in the kitchen, or cwtch up together watching a movie. It's in the way she cries my name; the way she moves above me; the way our tongues move together. It's in the rain-swept walks we take along the beach and the way her fingers lace into mine.

On my desk in a frame, a little creased and worn, is the cover of the cd Emily gave me that first Christmas – the photo of us at the concert. I once asked her why she loves it so much and she said, because it's the photo where I'm the most 'me'. When I try to get her to explain, she laughs. I try and see it, but when I stare at it, all I see is her, and the way she's looking at me and I can't believe it took us so long to get to where we could be everything to one another.

Now? She has her successful Coaching business and I have my writing – screenplays mainly, some tv work. I should be writing now but Emily's phone call has knocked me out of step for the day and I can't concentrate. I'll walk Lily and wait for Em to come home. Em's built up her business, but she's still hands-on. She reserves some spaces on all her courses for those kids who can't afford to pay and she scours the country for the very best kids she can. And then she gives her time to girls like her, who've been injured through accidents, or illness and she can give them time and hope and patience – all those things they need. All those things she needed when I first met her: all those things I needed when she first met me: just someone to bring us home.


End file.
